Counterstrike (Arrivals from the Dark, Book 2)
by ChronoLegion
Summary: Nearly four decades have passed since an attempted invasion of Earth left dozens of major cities in ruin and tens of millions dead. Having studied the invaders' technology, humanity is getting ready to strike back. One of those yearning to avenge the dead is a man with a dark secret, a secret that may prove invaluable in defeating the enemy.
1. Prologue

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (__Ответный __удар__) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Prologue  
**

**Crew Manifest of the Frigate **_**Commodore Litvin**_**,**

**USF Third Fleet**

_Paul Richard Corcoran_, Captain

_Selina Praagh_, Executive Officer

_Nikolay Tumanov_, First Navigator

_Oki Yamaguchi_, Second Navigator

_Yegor Seriy_, First Pilot

_Boniface Santini_, Pilot

_Bai Ling_, Pilot

_Kirill Pelevich_, Senior Weapons Officer

_Robert Wentworth_, Gunner

_Vladimir Pashin_, Gunner

_Samuel Bigelow_, Gunner

_Cro Light Water_, Gunner

_Sancho Hernandez_, Senior Engineer

_Sigurd Linder_, Cybernetic Engineer

_Camille Dupressis_, Communications Officer

_Klaus Siebel_, USF Secret Service Officer

* * *

_**Encyclopedia of the Space Wars of the 21st Century**_**,**

**New York – London – Paris – Moscow.**

**World Ultranet, 2104, Year 16 Post-Invasion.**

**Article "Historical Excursion"**

The 21st century has entered the military history as an era, when the military opposition between nations, political alliances, and various destructive elements expanded to the extent that it enveloped first the near-Earth space, and then the entire Solar System up to the Asteroid Belt and Jupiter's orbit. This was facilitated by several factors, both technological and those related to ecology and the growth of social unrest on Earth. Usually, historians distinguish four of them:

The creation of new construction materials and a compact fusion drive, making free movement of spacecraft within the Solar System possible.

A keen interest in resources necessary for the development of civilization: deposits of ores, minerals, pure metals, and other raw materials, including fuel, the sources of which could be other planets and the Asteroid Belt.

The demographic problem. While it was clear that none of the planets, including Mars and Venus, was suitable for mass colonization and that Earth's space fleet could not transport hundreds of millions, even billions, settlers to another world; nevertheless, the development of space technology provided certain prospects. In that era, the hopes of potential emigrants still seemed illusive, but many on the overpopulated Earth still believed that humanity would reach the stars and habitable planets, after which expansion into pristine worlds with untouched resources would be possible.

The last and most important factor consisted of political instability, the constant pressure experienced by Russia and the Western nations from China, India, the Arab world, and the other territories with an enormous population but a low standard of living. This pressure was noticeably by continuous terrorist attacks, as well as the activities of anti-globalization dissidents, acting the part of the fifth column in the most developed countries. These nations needed a new instrument of power over the world, a new method of suppressing the acts of terror, rebellions, and local wars, which would be distinguished by mobility and effectiveness. The space battle fleet became that instrument.  
The creation of the United Space Forces (USF) in 2054 was the milestone on the path of perfecting this instrument. The USF were answerable only to the UN Security Council [_A reminder that, in 2102, the UN was reformed into the World Parliament headed by the First Speaker, and the Security Council became the Solar System Security Committee, presided over by the Second Speaker of the Parliament. As for the USF structure, it largely remained unchanged._] and headed, like today, by a board of three admirals, one each from the USC, the EAU, and the EU [_USC is the United States and Canada; EAU is the Eurasian Union, including Russia, Belarus, a number of countries of the Caucasus, Central Asia, and the Mongolian Governorate; EU is the European Union._]. The first leaders of the Space Forces were the admirals Young (1991-2072), Robin (1996-2068), and Ilyin (2000-2076), who built this powerful organization that continues to exist, without any serious changes, in our time, over sixty years later. They divided their authority, creating three fleets, each including up to twenty powerful cruisers and nearly a hundred ships of smaller classes: frigates and corvettes. The First Fleet was focused on Luna and the near-Earth space, Mars was chosen as the base for the Second Fleet, Mercury and the Asteroid Belt became the bases for the Third. Soon, auxiliary but important structures appeared within the USF: the Marine Corps with rapid response teams and small fighter ships, the Research Corps, and several services (Secret, Information, Asteroid, and Solar). Recently, the Interstellar Space Monitoring Service has been added to them, tasked with watching our star's neighborhood, with the base on Pluto.  
However, in 2088, sixteen years ago, when the USF was headed by the admirals Chavez (b. 2040), Haley (b. 2034), and Timokhin (2037-2088), no one seriously considered that the military fleet would be needed to repel an external aggression. The hypothetical "others", "aliens", "extraterrestrials" still remained mere concepts without substance; the common hypothesis was that intelligent life in the galaxy was a unique event and that the possibility of a contact was negligible, and that, if such a contact were to take place, it would happen in a distant future, when space transportation would allow us to reach the stars and settle three or four dozen colonies. Until then, the fleet maintained order on Earth, in the Asteroid Belt, and the near-Solar space, as well as serving as the guarantee of protection against natural threats capable of destroying civilization on Earth: asteroid impacts, comet strikes, and hard radiation attacks due to increased solar activity.  
The appearance of the Bino Faata on an enormous starship, carrying nearly fifteen hundred autonomous combat units, was a complete surprise. The first contact, which took place on May 14, 2088, was accidental: the cruiser _Lark_ (see appropriate article), placing navigation beacons beyond Jupiter's orbit, detected a spike of gamma rays, launched four single-seat Vulture-class UFs [_UF is a universal fighter, a small multirole combat spacecraft._] and followed them to the epicenter of the explosion. Its cause is still unclear; it is assumed that Faata battle modules attacked and destroyed a scout starship of a race called the Silmarri, of which no reliable information exists. The Faata captured the human cruiser with a directed gravity beam and attempted to pull it to their ship; the captain of the _Lark_ fired swarms [_Swarm is a weapon launching a large amount of tiny particles, usually steel needles or beads, that fly at great speeds. In order to avoid clogging up space with metal, space-based weapons use tiny ice crystals._], however, the stream of particles was deflected by the alien starship's defense screen and perforated the cruiser and one of the fighters, hitting three others with glancing blows.  
Then the _Lark_ and the fighters were loaded into the Faata starship's hold as samples of Earth weapons. The only survivors were three UF pilots: wing commander Lieutenant Commander Paul Litvin, Lieutenant Abigail McNeil, and Lieutenant Richard Corcoran. The latter died soon after, officially having succumbed to wounds.  
The alien starship was only located when it was already approaching Mars's orbit. The messages received from the aliens were friendly in nature; however, a powerful flotilla was sent to intercept them under the command of Admiral Timokhin: admiral frigate _Suzdal_, heavy cruisers _Sakhalin_, _Pamir_, and _Lancaster_, medium cruisers _Sydney_, _Neva_, _Fuji_, _Paraná_, _Tiburon_, _Rhine_, _Viking_, and _Volga_ (see the appropriate articles: dates of commission, tactical and technical data). A task was placed before Timokhin by the Security Council: negotiate with the aliens, but keep their enormous starship away from Earth. (Note: At the time, the specifics of the _Lark_'s destruction were not known; it was thought that the cruiser was not establishing contact for an unclear reason.)  
The attempt to comply with the Security Council's directive using peaceful methods failed: the Faata wished to land on our planet, promising to give us a number of scientific achievements in exchange for an alliance treaty. However, there were doubts as to their sincerity, and the Security Council, as well as the leaders of the great powers confirmed the orders, which Timokhin was following. On June 3, 2088, the starship made an attempt to head for Earth; Timokhin's flotilla, barring its path, engaged the battle modules launched by the base ship and was obliterated; there were 2026 casualties, the crews of all twelve ships. The recording of this event, about six minutes in length, was sent by the aliens to Earth as evidence of their superiority and might (the infamous Message to the Presidents; see Ultranet).  
However, this victorious transmission was premature. During the fight, later dubbed the Battle of the Martian Orbit, Timokhin's flotilla launched a missile volley with the combined firepower of one hundred forty and thousand megaton at the alien ship. According to the official version, the Faata force shield was unable to completely absorb the energy of the explosion, and their starship was damaged. Apparently, the aliens (again, going by the official version) underestimated the severity of the damage or were unable to repair it on the way to Earth. When their gigantic ship descended to the Antarctic, at the South Pole, additional problems appeared in the internal communication and life support systems, which, likely, lead to confusion or even panic among the crew.  
It should be noted that the Faata starship, due to its enormous size (6 kilometers in length, 3 kilometers in diameter) was, essentially, a gravity machine. Separate sections of its structure, including the landing mechanisms, were nearly weightless, there were transportation shafts, holds, and other zero-gravity areas, air circulation was also achieved using gravity forces. Thus, artificial gravity was the basis behind the life support system, and the failure of grav generators or any device related to it could have fatal consequences. (Note: This information, received from Lieutenant Commander Litvin, was later confirmed by the examination of the starship's remains).  
Prior to the disaster, the aliens managed to send out several dozen battle modules with antimatter throwers, which hovered over the capitals and major cities of our planet. However, the chaos aboard the ship did not allow them to continue the operation, especially since Litvin and McNeil managed to escape their captives, get ahold of a small module, and use its weapon to deal significant harm to several of the ship's systems. Perhaps this ended up being the deciding factor in causing the disaster; a part of the crew was crushed by the falling internal structures, a part fell to death in gravity shafts, the remaining Faata suffocated, when the air supply was interrupted. Simultaneously, the autonomous modules self-destructed, whose explosions turned out to be not as powerful as expected; parts of cities such as London, Brussels, Beijing, Moscow, and Buenos Aires were destroyed within the half-a-kilometers radius from the blast. (Note: The number of casualties in cities was about 43 million.) Litvin and McNeil were not harmed; they managed to escape the dying ship.  
Such was the tragic ending to the first encounter between humankind and other, humanoid and technologically developed, lifeforms. Now, after sixteen years, when wounds have been healed, the damage repaired, and the remains of the starship studied in detail, we can make a reasonable conclusion that the Faata did not come to the Solar System on a friendly visit. The scope of this edition is limited to the military and historical themes, so we will not touch upon the various aspects of the aliens' civilization and culture. We will simply note that, in the biological sense, they are similar to the people of Earth (up to the possibility of mutual insemination), but one should not be deceived by this close or near-identical appearance; the psychology of the Bino Faata is different, and their social organization is sharply distinguished from Earth institutions. It is enough to point out that their social hierarchy includes two classes: the fully sentient (strictly speaking, the term "Bino Faata" refers specifically to them) and those of limited sentience (the so-called "t'ho"), who are separated into a number of subclasses or castes: workers, servants, soldiers, guards ("olks"), and the females only tasked with procreation ("ksa"). The Faata civilization, having lived through two global disasters ("Eclipses" using their terminology), is, at the moment, on the rise, and the primary element of their military doctrine is unlimited expansion. This makes the Bino Faata dangerous neighbors, especially since they have colonized several worlds somewhere on the edge of our arm of the galaxy.  
The study of the alien ship has significantly accelerated human science, technology, and military development. But this, apparently, is not what is important; the main importance is the notion about the multitude of habitable worlds that we have received. For the galaxy is not at all lifeless, and, among the races populating it, we can find both enemies and friends.

* * *

_**The Annals of the Invasion**_

**2118, Year 30 Post-Invasion**

**Claude Marais, philosopher, psychologist and sociologist, La Sorbonne.**

**Article "Lies and Truth about the Invasion",**

**Later becoming known as "The Marais Hypothesis"**

The thirtieth anniversary of the Invasion… A somber date celebrated throughout Earth with the thunder of victorious fanfare, although it would be more appropriate to sing funeral hymns and read psalms for the deceased. Forty-three million people! Forty-three million and two thousand servicemen and women of the Space Fleet, who gave their lives for the freedom of our planet and our star system! Their blood cries out for vengeance…

However, the events of those days have moved away from us, and the heroes may not be forgotten, but are perceived from a historical perspective, almost like the dead veterans of the First and Second World Wars, which took place back in the 20th century. As for the events related to the Invasion, everything seems to be clear, everything has been described in detail, analyzed a hundred times, and all the possible benefits (interstellar drive, grav generators, etc.) have already been extracted.

A big mistake!

I don't mean the appropriation of technological achievements, which opened the way to the stars for us, but the immediate events and facts related to the Battle of the Martian Orbit and the terrible disaster that befell the Bino Faata on Earth. I maintain that there is much vagueness and doubt in what occurred, and several circumstances smell of disinformation from the United Space Forces. Let me remind you that only the specialists of the USF Research Corps were able to study the Faata ship, that the place of its disaster near the South Pole is still a restricted area, and that no independent scientist, much less a journalist, has seen these remains in reality, with his own eyes, not as a holo-projection. To this day, the history of the arrival of the Bino Faata has only one undeniable fact: all the information about them is kept in the secret archives of the USF and is interpreted by the top brass in a way advantageous to them. There are rumors that the basis for these loose interpretations is a certain memorandum, put together by admirals Joseph Haley and Orlando Chavez in 2088, at the conclusion of those events, but, once again, no one has seen the document, and it is absent from the Ultranet. However, despite the lack of data and, I would say, the one-sidedness of the viewpoint, we can put forward certain questions and propose hypotheses explaining them, which is what we will do in this article.

The official version of what happened is split into two streams: external and internal. The external stream is thus: Timokhin's flotilla encounters the aliens near the Martian orbit and, after brief negotiations, engages them in combat. The Faata destroy the flotilla, send the Message to the Presidents, head to Earth, and land into the ice near the South Pole. As a result of the battle with Timokhin's ships, their starship is damaged, and that is all that we can extract from the external stream. As for the internal one, it is significantly more interesting and intriguingly mysterious: twenty days before the battle with the Third Fleet, the aliens have accidentally encountered the cruiser _Lark_ in the vicinity of Jupiter, destroyed it, and took three marine officers prisoner, whose names are known to everyone: Lieutenant Commander Pavel Litvin, Russian, commander of the fighter wing; Lieutenant Abigail McNeil, American, Vulture pilot; Lieutenant Richard Corcoran, Austrian, also Vulture pilot. Corcoran then died under mysterious circumstances, while Litvin and McNeil, either together or separately, escaped from their chamber and spent several days hiding from the Bino Faata crew, wandering the belly of their enormous ship. After its landing, both streams of information, the external and the internal, merge into one: Litvin and McNeil capture a small battle module in one of the hangars, fire its weapon, and the harm caused by them exacerbates the damage already received by the ship. The grav-generators fail, followed by the life support system, and the entire crew dies as a result. But Litvin and McNeil manage to flee on the stolen module! They remain in good health to this day, but refuse to give any interviews; rather, they confirm everything put forward by the official version. Meanwhile… Meanwhile, there are firmly established facts, accounting for which the "internal stream" (i.e. the events inside the ship, from the viewpoint of the two captive officers) becomes more vague.

First of all. It is known that Abigail McNeil did not return to her homeland (the state of Ohio), but moved to the Russian city of Smolensk, to the place of residence of Pavel Litvin and his parents. She had a child with her, a son, and while it is difficult to determine the age of an infant, approximate calculations show that, at the time of her capture, she was six or seven months pregnant. Strange, very strange, since female marine officers are contract-bound to avoid pregnancies! Her condition should have been noticed while she was aboard the _Lark_, but why did this not happen? Quite inexplicable! The father of the child is listed as the late Richard Corcoran, the boy (now a grown man) bears his name, and in one respect, at least, we need not doubt: he is the son of Abigail McNeil, as he looks very much like her. We have been able to determine that Paul Richard Corcoran serves in the Third Fleet, is married, has two children, and that his family is still in Smolensk.

Second. It could be suspected that the father of the young Paul Richard is, in fact, Litvin, but that is not the case (Corcoran was McNeil's lover, and, besides, any version of paternity fails to explain her rapid pregnancy). After his cosmic escapades, Litvin came to Smolensk with Abigail McNeil, her infant son, and another girl who became his lawful spouse and passed away six years after that. She was a woman of striking and unusual beauty (Litvin claimed she was Chilean or Peruvian) and did not leave any offspring, but she was very attached to McNeil's child. She is buried in Smolensk. By witness accounts, Litvin was inconsolable after her death. However, he found the strength to continue his military career, participated in interstellar expeditions to Baal and Astarte, and now holds the rank of commodore and the post of the chief of staff of the First Fleet.

Third. Any spacecraft is a vehicle with a tenfold margin of safety and durability, which, first and foremost, has to do with the life support system. Of course, this also has to be the case for the Bino Faata starship, which crossed the distance not of several lights years but of dozens of parsecs. How did Litvin cripple it? How did he know which important node should be hit? How did he escape from his cell, and why did they not find him immediately? How did he capture a battle module? And, finally, what aid in all these activities could have been provided by the pregnant McNeil?..

Nonsense! I deliberately pointed out that the "internal stream" is too vague and unsubstantiated. However, in this article, I will propose a hypothesis that will clear away any misunderstanding, answering the questions put forward above.

First, let's talk about McNeil and her child. It is obvious that human methods of reproduction were of interest of the aliens, and McNeil and Corcoran were subjected to a number of experiments. McNeil, most likely, underwent a procedure accelerating the development of the fetus; this could have outraged Corcoran; it is likely that he protested so much that they destroyed him. After that, the pregnant McNeil was not an aide for Litvin but a fellow officer, whom he rescued out of obedience to duty and a sense of friendship.

His true aide was another woman, who gave herself to him, as they say, body and soul, and this is the main link of my hypothesis: the girl he brought to Smolensk and whom he married was a Bino Faata! Likely a person of high rank, who knew much about the ship, its weapons, and vulnerabilities. This explains everything: Litvin's successful escape, the capture of the battle module, the success of his sabotage. He knew what to capture and where to strike! He was advised or, perhaps, even helped.

Naturally, this fact remained a secret. There are many reasons: the honor of the USF uniform, the pride of our race, the mood of the society, polarized by the Invasion into layers, groups, and subgroups; some hate the Bino Faata, others pray to them and believe that we have lost our paradise, and the third group, the so-called Binucks, a hooligan rabble, who believe that they are descended from the aliens, claiming that they had sprayed their seed above the Earth, causing thousands of women to conceive. Rubbish, nonsense! However, in our crazy world, Commodore Litvin's spouse had earned her right to serenity and a quiet peaceful life in the provincial Smolensk. If people knew who she was!.. If they only knew!.. But she died almost a quarter of a century ago, her husband wanders through space, and I decided that it was time to publish my hypothesis.

A hypothesis, a suggestion, nothing more! Perhaps, someday, we will find out the whole truth, if Commodore Litvin, who is not a young man anymore, leaves us his notes and if his memoirs are not classified for the next century. But I will still share with you some of my seditious thoughts that are especially pleasing to me as a Frenchman. What if we owe our salvation not to the might of our cruisers, not to the heroes of the space fleet, not to the bravery of Admiral Timokhin, and not even to Pavel Litvin, but solely to a woman who had sacrificed everything for love? I repeat, this would be pleasing to me. I would have received evidence that love is a much greater force in the galaxy than warships and plasma throwers.

* * *

**WRITING ON A FENCE NEAR THE OSTANKINO TOWER,**

**Moscow, 2101, Year 13 Post-Invasion**

We will be back to spill your blood. Binucks.

* * *

**UNITED SPACE FORCES ARCHIVE**

**Lunar Base.**

_**Summary**_**,**

**The Haley-Chavez Memorandum, presented to the UN Security Council in September of 2088, Month 3 Post-Invasion**

Restricted materials. As was discovered in the process of the armed conflict with the Bino Faata in the current year, and, first and foremost, during the action later dubbed the Battle of the Martian Orbit, the USF proved unable to resist a focused and persistent aggression from space. At that, we see no fault in either our general actions or, in particular, the combat tactics employed by Admiral Timokhin during the battle with the aliens. Its result—a complete destruction of twelve warships, a half of the Third Fleet—would have breen impossible to change by a concentration of greater firepower, more successful maneuvers, or a laser strike instead of the missile launch undertaken by Timokhin. We believe that, in any case, the result would have been the same, since the Faata base starship carried nearly three hundred large and over a thousand small battle modules armed with antimatter emitters, which is an order of magnitude greater than the combined strength of all the divisions of the USF. Even not accounting for the element of surprise, which also did not work in our favor, we would be incapable of defeating such an armada.

Doubtless, the situation will change within the next several years. The study of the Faata ship has already given a powerful boost to all the branches of science and technology and will soon take us to the galactic knowledge level, which means that, in five to ten years, we will no longer be vulnerable to any aggression, no matter the source, be it the Bino Faata or any other denizens of the galaxy. We have already laid down a series of new ships, capable of exploring the nearby stars, we have begun the construction of bases in Pluto's orbit and launched over fifty automated scout probes to the edges of the Solar System; there is no doubt that, in the coming years, we will be able to monitor the near-Solar space up to and including the Oort cloud [_The Oort cloud (or, going by the names of the astronomers who studied it, the Öpik–Oort cloud) is an area on the periphery of the Solar System full of fragments planetary substances that, when approaching the Sun, become comets. Located 150,000 Astronomical Units away. An Astronomical Unit (AU) is equal to 149.6 million kilometers, the average distance between the Earth and the Sun._].

However, the progress of military technology requires adequate, if not greater, effort in the area of psychology. Let's clarify the situation by listing the main moments of the recent tragedy:

The cruiser _Lark_ was destroyed in the vicinity of Jupiter during the first encounter with the Bino Faata. The only ones left alive were Lieutenant Commander Pavel Litvin and two of his subordinates, Lieutenants Abigail McNeil and Richard Corcoran, kept prisoner aboard the alien ship. Corcoran then died as a result of biological experiments, while McNeil was sedated and artificially inseminated. The goal of this procedure was clear: to cross-breed a Faata and a human in order to produce a hybrid race of servants (possibly warriors). Litvin managed to flee his captivity. With a device he found, the source of which he is unaware, he contacted the quasi-sentient intelligence (a computer?.. a living being?..), performing the functions of control aboard the ship. Most of the information regarding the Bino Faata was received by Litvin from this device (being).

During the second encounter, when Admiral Timokhin attempted to block the aliens' path to Earth, his flotilla was completely destroyed. We would like to emphasize: completely. Three modern cruisers, eight medium cruisers, a frigate, and two thousand crewmembers. There were no survivors. The (presumable) Bino Faata losses were five or six battle modules.

The Faata base starship headed for Earth and, unobstructed, landed in the Antarctic, near the South Pole. (It is assumed that the aliens required a significant amount of water.) Simultaneously with the ice collection, the starship launched several dozen battle modules, which took up positions over major Earth cities.

Litvin, who was hiding in one of the tunnels with a communication line of the quasi-sentient intelligence along with McNeil and a Faata female named Yo, insists that a being materialized in front of him in human form, calling itself Gunther Voss and other names (Liu Chang, Umkhonto Tlume, Roy Bunch, demonstrating the appropriate appearances). Voss introduced himself as an emissary of a starfaring race unknown to humans and offered his services. He teleported in a certain device that destroyed the quasi-mind, after which the starship stopped functioning as a unified system, its crew was killed, and the launched modules exploded, causing destruction in a number of cities. Voss transported Litvin and his two companions to a safe place and disappeared.

The information, received from Litvin, McNeil, and, partially, Yo, the only Bino Faata to survive, was thoroughly analyzed by psychologists, as well as the specialists who were studying and continue to study the remains of the extraterrestrial ship. There are no doubts as to its authenticity. Besides that, we do not know of any other reason capable of causing a disaster of such a scale aboard the interstellar ship which has crossed the path from the edge of the galactic spiral.

The above can be interpreted by the politicians, mass media, and portions of the population as a failure of the USF defense efforts and our helplessness before the face of cosmic aggression. In essence, that is true, but it is necessary to actively fight such attitudes, for their negative consequences seem obvious. To this end, the identity of the Faata female Yo, the identity of the emissary Voss, and the role he played in these events must be kept fully classified, and the facts described above need to be given a new interpretation. Here is a possible cover story.

While Admiral Timokhin and his crews were unable to protect Earth from invasion, they did their duty and died a heroic death. During the Battle of the Martian Orbit, they inflicted serious damage to the alien starship, as a result of which the Faata landed in the unpopulated Antarctic, not willing to risk selecting a more convenient landing site, like the vicinity of Moscow, New York, Paris, or another large city. Lieutenant Commander Litvin, on the ship at the time, managed to take advantage of the situation, captured and activated one of the small battle modules, allowing him to destroy the alien starship's life support system. He was able to escape (along with McNeil, of course) aboard the module when the disaster struck.

The abovementioned version of events explains the main facts and, after adding a number of details, needs to be introduced into the public consciousness using all means of propaganda. Either way, the Space Fleet has done its job! This thought must become a panacea to the feelings of doom, panic, rampant chaos and anarchy, which could grip the planet in the near future. We also believe that the names of the fallen heroes (first and foremost, Admiral Timokhin) should be immortalized using all traditional methods, both artistic (books, films, statues, etc.) and informational (Ultranet sites, memorial associations and foundations, establishment of special prizes and awards), the necessary funds for which will be allocated by the USF. As for Lieutenant Commander Litvin, he is to be given the Crown of Glory, First Class, and, after a period of rest, will be promoted to resume his service on a ship of the Third Fleet.

Special note. Lieutenant McNeil (nine months pregnant) is currently checked into the hospital at the USF Lunar Base. Ultrasound has shown that she is expecting a boy, officially the son of the late Richard Corcoran, with whom McNeil was in a relationship. According to the mother's wishes, he is to be named Paul Richard (in honor of Pavel Litvin and his alleged father). Subsequently, if the child turns out to be viable, he will remain under the observation of the USF Secret Service. The same will be done with Abigail McNeil and Yo, the Faata female.

Signed,

CINC First Fleet, Admiral Orlando Chavez.

CINC Second Fleet, Admiral Joseph Haley.

* * *

**SOLAR SYSTEM SECURITY COMMITTEE**

**USF SECRET SERVICE**

**File #112/56-AD,**

**Subject Gunther Voss.**

**2121, Year 33 Post-Invasion**

Top Secret.

NAME (ALIAS USED BY THE SUBJECT): Gunther Voss. Other aliases: Liu Chang, Umkhonto Tlume, Roy Bunch.

DATE OF BIRTH: Not established. Assumed age: several hundred years.

PLACE OF BIRTH: Not established. Assumed to be one of the planets of the galaxy populated by a non-humanoid race.

PARENTS: Blank.

CLOSE RELATIVES: Blank.

PLACE OF RESIDENCE: Not established. In 2088, prior to the Invasion, resided in several locations (Brussels, Singapore, and others) in accordance with his aliases and appearances.

FALSE STATUS: Took up various positions in human society. Four of them are known and have been studied in detail:

Gunther Voss, reporter and "digger" (specialist for locating sensational news) for the weekly magazine _CosmoSpiegel_. Caucasian male; see sketch and other information in Appendix A;

Liu Chang, astronomer, undergoing fellowship at the orbital Kepler Laboratory and the first detect the flash near Jupiter (the result of a battle between the Faata and a Silmarri ship). Chinese male; see sketch and other information in Appendix A;

Umkhonto Tlume, diplomat, temporary representative of the Free Zulu Territory in the UN Security Council. African male; see sketch and other information in Appendix A;

Roy Bunch, staff communications officer at the USF ground base in Singapore. Caucasian male; see sketch and other information in Appendix A;

REAL STATUS: An emissary of an unknown highly-developed race (provisional name: Metamorphs or Proteids [_From the name of the Ancient Greek god Proteus, son of Poseidon, capable of changing his appearance._]), capable of radically altering his appearance and, likely, metabolism and physiology. The reasons for the Proteids' hostility towards the Bino Faata have not yet been established, but there is no reason to doubt the fact. During the time of the Invasion, their emissary engaged in multiple activities: Liu Chang proposed the hypothesis regarding the appearance of a hostile extraterrestrial ship in the Solar System; Gunther Voss voiced a series of sensational materials on this topic; Umkhonto Tlume insistently informed the UN Security Council of the Invasion; Roy Bunch undertook the appropriate propaganda among the USF ranks. The goal of all these activities (and, possibly, others as yet undetermined) was to cause Earth's military forces to actively oppose and, in the end, destroy the Bino Faata. But this action was, effectively, carried out by the Metamorph emissary himself. When the aliens had landed, he delivered and given to Lieutenant Commander Litvin a container with micro-robots, a biomechanical analogue to insects, which engaged in disassembly of the tissues of the quasi-sentient device controlling the ship. Its destruction led to the deaths of the entire Faata crew.

PHYSIOLOGICAL INDICATORS: Unknown. Capable of altering his facial features, height, weight, skin color within the limits of human appearance. Capable of teleporting objects up to one hundred kilograms within the boundary of Earth and up to several grams to interplanetary distances (as evidenced by Lieutenant Commander Litvin).

PSYCHOLOGICAL INDICATORS: All the persons who interacted with Voss, Liu Chang, Tlume, and Bunch note that the emissary was absolutely believably imitating human behavior and emotions; none of the interviewees doubted that they were speaking to a human. However, this tolerance, as well as the aid in combatting the Faata, do not mean that the Proteid emissary and all of his people are friendly towards humanity. A careful forecast can be made that they are, at the very least, not hostile to us. Nothing is known about the other psychological indicators or driving motives.

SPECIAL NOTE: After the destruction of the Faata, Voss disappeared. It can be assumed that he, taking on another appearance, is still located on Earth. His former contacts are being thoroughly traced.

* * *

**SOLAR SYSTEM SECURITY COMMITTEE**

**USF SECRET SERVICE**

**File #112/56-AF,**

**Subject Paul Richard Corcoran.**

**2123, Year 35 Post-Invasion**

Top Secret.

NAME: Paul Richard Corcoran.

DATE OF BIRTH: September 22, 2088.

PLACE OF BIRTH: USF Lunar Base hospital.

PARENTS: Abigail McNeil (see file #122/56-AB), Richard Corcoran (deceased; see file #122/56-AC).

Note: As determined by genetic experts in 2088, immediately after birth, and again in 2099, Paul Richard Corcoran is not the son of Richard Corcoran. Several features of the chromosome set provide irrefutable evidence that he is the patrilineal descendant of a Bino Faata (see file #122/56-AB, section "Experiments conducted on Lieutenant McNeil on the alien ship").

CLOSE RELATIVES: Mother – Abigail McNeil; wife – Vera Corcoran (née Kovaleva, marriage registered in 2114); daughters – Nadezhda (b. 2116) and Lyubov (b. 2117).

PLACE OF RESIDENCE: EAU, Russia, Smolensk, Holmy neighborhood, house 94 (private residence).

STATUS: USF officer at the rank of commander, first officer aboard the cruiser _Europe_, Third Fleet.

Service record:

2105-2111: cadet at the Baikonur Space Academy. Graduated cum laude. Upon completion, awarded the rank of junior lieutenant.

2111-2113: pilot of Vulture-class UF, attached to the cruiser _Taiga_, Third Fleet. Awarded the rank of lieutenant in 2112.

2113-2114: USF Graduate Navigator School, Málaga. Upon completion, awarded the rank of lieutenant commander.

2114-2117: second navigator, the cruiser _Genghis Khan_, Third Fleet.

2117: USF special courses, Lunar Base. Specializations: Human Resources, Strategy and Tactics of Space Warfare, Utilization of Military Robots.

2118-2120: third officer, the cruiser _Europe_, Third Fleet.

2120-2122: second officer, the cruiser _Europe_, Third Fleet. Awarded the rank of commander in 2122.

2122-present: first officer, the cruiser _Europe_, Third Fleet.

Participation in combat operations: see Appendix A.

List of awards and distinctions: see Appendix B.

MEDICAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL INDICATORS: Absolutely healthy, stable psyche. Decisive, brave, proactive. Somewhat closed-in. Recommended to be placed on USF command reserve. For detailed characteristics and test results, see Appendix C.

SPECIAL NOTE: Knows the secret of his origins. Possesses a paranormal gift (capability to engage in a mental contact), which he, obviously, inherited from his Faata ancestor. Corcoran's children have not yet exhibited such talents.

* * *

_**The Washington Post**_

**September 24, 2120,**

**Year 32 Post-Invasion.**

**Review of the blockbuster movie **_**Invasion**_

Produced by Star Light (Hollywood), Roskino (Moscow).

Producer: C. Vanderbilt; director: A. Mikhalkov

Starring: Chuck Norris, Jr., Alex Glukhov, Jacqueline Mao, Vanessa Straub, Peter Van Damme, Olaf Lindgren.

In the thirty-two years since the Invasion, the tragedy of the first interstellar conflict has served as the source material for many hundreds of documentary and feature holofilms, not to mention thousands of books, articles in the press and the Ultranet and multiple investigations conducted by scientists, politicians, and journalists. However, great events can only be adequately reflected by great people, whose talent and spiritual strength are comparable to the scale of the cataclysm. Which is what happened in this case, as Cornelius Vanderbilt and Arman Mikhalkov are, without a doubt, the greatest figures in cinema since Charlie Chaplin.

It is always difficult to review a brilliant production, as, for one, the supply of praise is limited, two, all the appropriate words are as jaded as an ancient computer disk, and third, one must find and point out some flaws, as it is the duty of a reviewer with a firm belief that there is no ointment without a fly. But, as the saying goes, the broken road is the most trusted, and we, following it, will put away the talk about the flaws and first speak of the merits.

The main of them, without a doubt, is the historical accuracy, as confirmed by the USF personnel involved in those events and professional historians. Along with that, the director gave free reign to his creative imagination, combining the official version with the so-called "Marais Hypothesis", published by the eponymous French scholar in the _Annals of the Invasion_ in 2118. Even if this story of the love of a man from Earth and an alien woman is fictional, it is, most definitely, one that adorns the work of a great master, uniting the cosmic tragedy of the worlds with the tragedy of human emotion.

The rest is quite authentic. The interior of the alien Ship, through which Litvin (Chuck Norris, Jr.) is wondering, were reproduced in great detail, as were the moments of the Battle of the Martian Orbit, the destruction of the cruiser _Lark_, and the disaster awaiting the alien starship in the Antarctic ice. But, perhaps, the most impressive and emotionally tense are not the battle scenes, not the lyrical scenes between Litvin and Yo (Jacqueline Mao), but the images of the landing Ship, when the gigantic cylinder six kilometers in height and three in diameter falls upon the Southern continent. This also fits with the historical truth: as is known, during the battle with the flotilla commanded by Admiral Timokhin (Olaf Lindgren), the Ship sustained heavy damage, aggravated by the impact on the surface of the glacier. That is what allowed Commander Litvin to capture a battle module during the panic and destroy the air supply controls and other vital devices.

Oh, that picture, when the artificial asteroid, splashing away herds of clouds and creating vortices, is plummeting to the icy landmass! When it descends to the rocky surface under the eternal glacier, when monstrous fountains of steam rush up into the air, falling back down as rain, when the wind is cracking the fields of ice, smashing ice mountains into the sea, sending waves into all directions, to Tierra del Fuego and the Cape of Good Hope, to Tasmania and New Zealand! A truly apocalyptic sight! But, like all the other computer reconstructions based on historical materials supplied by the USF, Arman Mikhalkov made use of the infamous Message to the Presidents, a recording sent by the Bino Faata to the Presidents of Russia, USC, and other nations after destroying Timokhin's flotilla as a symbol of their victory. We now know that it was a Pyrrhic victory; the alien starship was damaged by the massive missile volley launched by our ships.

As for the cast ensemble, only one thing could be said – it was put together brilliantly. Besides the already-mentioned Chuck Norris, Jr., Olaf Lindgren, and Jacqueline Mao, it includes such A-list stars as Alex Glukhov, soulfully performing the small but tragic role of Lieutenant Corcoran, Vanessa Straub (his sweetheart Abby McNeil), and Peter Van Damme, who had the most difficult task of portraying an alien. Van Damme is quite convincing as the leader of the Bino Faata, the merciless Pillar of Order Yata. As stated by informed sources, he did not even have to put on makeup; he is slim, graceful, dark-haired, and his facial features are reminiscent of the Faata: a high forehead, wide cheekbones, and a narrow but strong chin. Van Damme could have perhaps become the star of the season in the role of the alien leader, had he not been eclipsed by the lovely Jacqueline Mao, playing Yo, the charming alien girl, who survived the disaster and, according to the Marais Hypothesis, became Commander Litvin's wife. This acting duo, we mean Jacqueline and Chuck, portrays the sudden passion so sincerely, so frankly, so…

(This is followed by twelve more praising paragraphs. As for the flaws, the reviewer sees them in the excessive realism of several especially violent scenes: specifically, the scene of Admiral Timokhin's death, incinerated on the bridge of the frigate _Suzdal_, and the images of the deaths of the aliens, trapped in their ship with a failing life support system. Finally, the reviewer engages in a fierce debate with a number of journalists, some of whom believe that the Marais Hypothesis is nonsense unworthy of being mentioned, and others claim that the blockbuster _Invasion_ was financed by the USF and primarily promotes the official version of the events, which is fairly controversial.)

* * *

**WRITING ON A FENCE NEAR THE JOHN F. KENNEDY INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, NEW YORK,**

**2120, Year 32 Post-Invasion**

We are back. Tremble, ye cursed t'ho! Binucks.

* * *

**UNITED SPACE FORCES**

**Mercury 1 base**

**Order of the Third Space Fleet, on March 7, 2125, Year 37 Post-Invasion**

By this order, Commander Paul Richard Corcoran is relieved from the post of first officer aboard the cruiser _Europe_ and is given command of the frigate _Commodore Litvin_ with the promotion to the rank of captain.

The frigate _Commodore Litvin_ is to be attached to Special Task Force 37.

Signed: CINC Third Fleet, Admiral Konstantin Yumashev.


	2. Chapter 1

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (Ответный удар) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Chapter 1**

**Dreams**

**2125, space beyond Pluto's orbit and the Baal System**

Paul Corcoran saw Dreams often. Not regular dreams that every person experienced, the ones that were reminiscent of their earthly existence refracted through the prism of the sleeping mind, but something else, not in any way related to life or Corcoran's loved ones or, for example, to his flights between planets and stars. Of course, he also saw ordinary dreams, and he was visited in them by Vera in her wedding dress, and their girls Lyubasha and Nadenka, and his mother, bent over his bed, and Uncle Pavel and Aunt Yo, and other landscapes and faces; they came and left, not leaving a sense of unreality, for those events and people were familiar to him and, for the most part, close and dear. As for the Dreams, which he always designated with a capital "D", they seemed to flow in from the cosmic emptiness, from some unknown astral abyss; at the very least, neither the past nor Corcoran's memories served as their foundation. Sometimes, he saw himself from outside, naked, hanging in an enormous hall among other naked people or submerged into some translucent viscous substance; sometimes hallways opened to him, brightly lit, wide and endless, like a path to an unknown galaxy; sometimes ruins of a gigantic city rose up to him, but not like any city on Earth: the buildings were not made of stone, not put together from metallic parts, but seemingly cast entirely from plastic, which cracked from the time and covered by a layer of brown and red moss. Occasionally, he spoke or argued with someone, but not in Russian, English, or Spanish, but in some special language, in the language of thought, where words and thoughts were equal and seemed to spur one another on: the sound merged with the mental image, the image extended what the words left out. Then again, in the Dreams, the language was a familiar detail, it was a language taught to him by Yo, he remembered it as clearly as three decades ago, on the day of her death. But what did it talk about, why did he argue?.. More often than not, the memory of these conversations melted away along with the departing Dream.

But now he was in silence and quiet. The silence and the quiet reined in his sleeping consciousness and on the bridge, and outside the frigate _Commodore Litvin_; they stretched from Pluto's orbit to the farthest stars, shining on the viewscreen. Corcoran did not see the stars; it was Selina Praagh's watch, who took her responsibilities so zealously that the Captain could take a nap. The Dream that had descended on him from the layer of mirages and phantoms was unusual, having come to him only five or six times in his life, which meant that he needed to watch this rarity from beginning to end.

He was standing in a strange grove under an enormous tree, whose crown opened up like an umbrella made of intertwined branches and broad leaves; the tree was surrounded by a ring of other trees of the same kind, but not as large, the soil was overgrown with blue-green grass or moss, and the sun floated in the cloudless violet sky, not as golden as on Earth, but more orange, twice the size of Earth's sun. Such a sky, grass, and trees were not present on Baal, or Astarte, or any other world he knew, although, having served in the space fleet for fourteen years, he'd landed on many planets, and knew even more from holovisual recordings. The number of worlds studied from the moment the contour drive opened the way to the stars kept growing, not overcoming, however, the limits of human memory; and captains, pilots, and navigators were required to know them by heart. He knew for certain that no planet with such atmospheric refraction had ever been visited by humans.

The trees surrounding the central giant blocked the view. Corcoran made several leaps, which were light, swift, as only happens in dreams, slipped between two bulging trunks and whirled his head back and forth, examining the locale. The strange grove crowned the top of a gently-sloping hill, around which stretched a plain with the same blue-green grass, with other hills with the same smooth, soft features, with trees planted in a circle or growing so due to some natural causes. The plain was crossed by a river, slow and wide, and either buildings or barracks were visible on its bank: long, low, white, looking like an upside-down pirogue. Loaded platforms were slowly moving towards one of them, disappearing in the dark sink of the gates. They seemed to be carrying grass; Corcoran was almost certain of that, even though it was difficult to see the cargo in detail.

Genetic memory… That which had been seen and known by one of his ancestors, distant or close, was feeding his Dreams… Aunt Yo, who'd taught him the language, hadn't mentioned that; at least Corcoran did not remember it, and everything she had told him was firmly in his head. But she was a t'ho, only a t'ho, and Corcoran clearly descended from a Bino Faata of the ruling caste, from a being with a highly-developed brain. Klaus Siebel held to that opinion, and who was a better judge than him? _Or me,_ Corcoran thought, still in the sleepy oblivion. At thirty-seven years old, a man knew enough about himself to learn the secrets of his own mind, soul, and heart. Especially if he was not entirely human...

The platforms drifted and drifted in unending succession, falling into the open maw of the gates, and he guessed that he was looking at a food factory. Was that his own conclusion or something prompted by the memory of his ancestor? Probably the latter: in the rare Dreams, where he happened to find himself in the world of the violet skies, he was unable to get close to the buildings on the river bank. This meant that the Faata, his biological father, had not been there, and no memories, except for the general picture, were preserved; unless, of course, the memories faded when transferring from ancestor to offspring. Corcoran did not discount such a tendency, but neither he nor Siebel had data to support it.

Nevertheless, he attempted to take a step towards the factory by the river, but it ended the same way it usually did: the Dream was interrupted. The sudden feeling of concern and a mental pulse coming from Selina Praagh woke him up entirely.

"Captain!"

Corcoran's eyelids came up, his eyes swung to the viewscreen, then to the pilot's controls, which were manned by Santini. A silver holographic haze was dimly flaring up above them with dark glyph [_Glyphs are a system of characters used when transmitting messages over cosmic distances. A trained specialist can read them at a glance, while computers use glyphs to correct and restore speech._] symbols floating in the depth. The transition from Dream to reality was sudden, but such leaps had long ceased to disorient Corcoran; he had an unusually stable psyche.

"Captain, signal from the flagship. We're at T minus twenty." Selina's voice was even, there was no excitement in it; it would not be her first time going through Limbo [_Limbo is a dimension of quantum chaos, an unordered portion of the universe, the inverse side of matter structured in the Metagalaxy. When submerged in Limbo, it becomes possible to combine two points (two contours of a material body) at different locations of metagalactic space and perform an instant transition between them. This effect is used by all highly-developed races for interstellar travel._].

"I see. All hands to battle stations."

Selina Praagh relayed his order. She was a good assistant, reliable, competent, and probably capable of more than serving aboard a small scout frigate. "First Officer on a cruiser" would sound more reputable, but here she wasn't even called "first"; the _Commodore Litvin_ was not a large ship, so there was no need for a second or shird officer. But in any of the three fleets, the honor of being assigned to a selected crew was valued higher than postings.

Corcoran turned to the sensor screen. Outlines of enormous warships crawled in its depth, formed up in a loose line: the closest one was the flagship _Europe_, where he'd served not long ago, followed by five of her sister ships, all starting with "A", five heavy cruisers of the same class: _Asia_, _America_, _Africa_, _Australia_, and _Antarctica_. Task Force 37, as it was called in the secret list of the Third Space Fleet, or the Retaliatory Squadron, as it was unofficially called. "37" was not the number of the unit and did not indicate something like the thirty-seventh model of a ship or a weapon; the symbolism was different, reminding people that thirty-seven years had passed since the Faata Invasion. Over a third of a century; more than enough time to figure out the secrets of the alien starship, create their own, not as gigantic but still powerful, search the Sun's neighborhood for thirty parsecs in all directions and think about vengeance. The only one who knew what sort of vengeance it would be was Commodore Karel Vrba, the man in command of Task Force 37; only he had access to the Security Committee's directives and documents, handed to him by the Second Speaker personally. Actually, Pavel Litvin was supposed to have led the squadron, but man proposed, and God disposed, granting each person his own lifespan... After Litvin's death, the new task force commander had been selected with great care, and Vrba was clearly the best candidate: experienced, cool-headed, not yet old, and prepared to follow any order. His father and older brother had been killed at the Battle of the Martian Orbit, and Vrba loathed the aliens with a fierce hatred. But personal feelings did not affect his decisions.

First Navigator Nikolay Tumanov entered the bridge, wordlessly saluted the Captain and sat in the chair of the ANS [_Astronavigation System_] terminal. Klaus Siebel, translator, expert, and USF Secret Service officer, slipped in behind him like a shadow. He and Corcoran exchanged smiles; they had known one another for over thirty years, which allowed them to skip the formalities. The frigate's bridge could not fit more than five people: three cocoon seats [_A cocoon is a biomechanical seat/suit, keeping the occupant safe during sharp maneuvers and connected to the systems controlling the drives, weapons, and other ship's systems._] at the control panels, the Captain's panel and seat behind them on a small dais, and one more backup cocoon near the hatch. The remaining eleven crewmembers were at their posts on the auxiliary bridge, in turrets, at the long-range communication panel, and in the tiny cubbyhole traditionally called the reactor room, even though there was not and had never been a reactor on the ship. There was a gravity drive for in-system maneuvering and a tube one hundred and twenty meters in length — the contour drive's acceleration shaft.

A dark row of characters of a coded message flashed past above the pilot's console.

"Ten minutes to jump, sir," Selina spoke. Her dark face with delicate oriental features seemed to Corcoran to be cast from bronze; only her hazel eyes were alive, restless, betraying the tension gripping the woman.

"All sections report," he ordered, bending down to the intercom and peering at the scarlet stripe slowly crawling along the Captain's panel. To the right of it was the pentalion, a stylized imprint of a five-fingered hand, the "paw" in the pilots' slang; it was the trigger activating the contour drive. More precisely, it activated the ANS program controlling the drive.

"Navigation section ready," Tumanov said, staring into the obsidian depth of the viewscreen.

In it, following the computer's command, two stars flared bright: Sol and Baal, the start and finish points. Twenty-three parsecs, seventy-six light years...

"Engineering section ready," the voice of Sancho Hernandez boomed from the vocoder. "Full power to the circuit in five and a half minutes."

Corcoran nodded. The scarlet stripe on his panel continued its leisurely movement. When it reached the edge of the pentalion's thumb, the inside of the acceleration shaft would be illuminated by light unbearable to the human eye. Then, one movement of the hand, an imperceptible burst of electrons in molecular computer chips, and the contour drive would fling the frigate through the quantum foam [_Quantum foam is the chaotic fluctuations of the force fields in the Limbo dimension, the "reverse side" of the ordered Creation._] of Limbo. The frigate and six cruisers, capable of cracking a planet and turning its fragments to dust... Thirty-two hundred people, six hundred combat Peregrines, annihilators, robots, plasma throwers, containers with virulent organics...

Weapons Officer Pelevich, as expected, reported third, "Combat section ready."

Kirill Pelevich, wrapped in a cocoon and connected to the annihilator, was currently hanging in a compartment behind the bridge, while his four gunners were sitting in cramped turrets, which were sticking out of the _Litvin_'s hull as streamlined blisters. There was really no reason to prepare for battle, as the Baal System, colonized and inhabited for several decades now, had patrol ships, forts, and a long-range detection service. But regulations required that every jump be accompanied by a Red Alert [_Red Alert – full battle readiness._], since they were not certain who would be waiting them in the colony world: their own people with a party or aliens with bombs and cannons. Not counting the Faata, humans had encountered three spacefaring races, and these first contacts had not instilled in them great confidence. The Lo'ona Aeo, who looked like fragile elves, seemed to be peace-loving and even offered to trade, but the Haptors and the Dromi did not see humans as their fellow sentient brethren and did not entertain friendly thoughts towards them. Fortunately, their areas of influence [_Area of influence is a sector of the galaxy dominated by a certain star-faring race._] were far from Sol and humanity's first colonies.

Selina Praagh turned her head, looked Siebel over, who was sitting in the seat by the hatch, and reported, "Command section ready, Captain."

She treated Klaus Siebel with special attention, the reason for which Corcoran had yet to figure out. Perhaps it was because Siebel was not a young man and not a professional astronaut, which meant that he needed to be taken care of; perhaps Selina Praagh was following the female tendency to care for someone, and Siebel, short, frail, and looking like an aging teenager, fit that role more than the rest of the crew. _Don't make a mistake, my dear,_ Corcoran thought and smiled inwardly. He had taken command of the ship four months ago, and Praagh knew Siebel for exactly that long, while he himself had known him for over thirty years; thirty-one, to be precise. Siebel's appearance was deceptive, instilling the idea of his helplessness, innate goodness, and even some immaturity, but it was only a mask. He was a man of steel, that Siebel! And mysterious! Perhaps it was the mysteries that attracted Selina?..

"T minus three," she said, glancing at the glyphs, once again flickering in the air, with her dark eye.

Half of the close-range sensor screen was taken up by the _Europe_'s massive hulk; behind her vague shadows of the other ships could be seen, no longer stretched out in a line but gathered in a tight formation near the flagship. The _Europe_'s computer was now controlling all these maneuvers, allowing them to perform a synchronized jump and arrive to a specific finish point, at the very edge of the Baal System, far from any gravitating masses. Technically, powerful gravity fields did not interfere with the immersion into Limbo, but they did affect the accuracy of the jump, blurring the finish area up to several light days, sometimes even months. After a jump, a good fleet commander could gather the ships in under an hour, preferably within several minutes.

A scarlet pillar of fire flared three times above Santini's console.

"Get ready!" Corcoran said. "Engaging the drive."

The scarlet stripe on his panel was already touching the pentalion's thumb. He raised his hand and froze for a moment, lowering his eyelids and sensing all the crewmembers, as if they were hiding somewhere in the depths of his consciousness, invisible and silent, but connected to him by chains of mental pulses. He sensed the anxiety felt by Hernandez, Praagh, and Pelevich, the tense readiness of the gunners, Wentworth, Bigelow, Pashin, and Light Water, the fear gripping Dupressis, the young communications officer, and the cybernetic engineer Linder, he heard the traditional prayer repeated by the pilots and navigators, Tumanov, Yamaguchi, Seriy, Bai Ling, Santini; each of them did it in their own language, but the meaning was the same: "Let us not be swallowed up by the Eternal Darkness, let it come apart, melt away, let us see the starlight, let the Lord of Emptiness, the Ruler of Creation, protect us. Let..." The prayer, fear, anxiety were the natural reactions before a jump, and only one person remained calm and steady, like a rock. Siebel... Old Klaus Siebel, known to him since childhood, who had replaced Yo, and then Uncle Pavel, almost like a relative, but still an enigma...

Corcoran lowered his hand, firmly pressing his palm to the pentalion. That was his privilege as captain, to send the ship on her way through the infinity of Limbo. To send her on a distant road to the edge of the galactic arm, to the Void and the New Worlds of the Bino Faata.

A harsh chord came from the ceiling of the bridge, something shuddered inside and tensed as a taut string, light blinked, the screens went out for a brief, imperceptible fraction of the second and immediately came back up. An alien sky was staring at Corcoran as hundreds of bright stars, and there was no Orion's Belt, no Ursa Minor or Major, no Cassiopeia, no constellations of the zodiac. But was it alien, though?.. He'd been to Baal twice, on the _Europe_'s shakedown cruise, and remembered that a dozen of these heavenly lights were called the Maltese Cross, and a pair of those, blue and gentle ones, were the Virgin Mary's Eyes. Babies, born in their sight, had already grown up and referred to themselves as children of Baal rather than Earthlings... No, these skies were definitely not alien!

Tumanov loudly exhaled with visible relief.

"We are in the predetermined area, Captain. The coordinates..." He reached for the ANS panel, and a bizarre web of glyphs lit up above the Captain's panel.

Baal's system had seven planets, but there were no gas giants like Jupiter and no asteroid belt; the world nearest to the star was reminiscent of Mercury, the second was the inhabited Baal with three small moons, the remaining planetoids were giant dead rocks, orbiting far from the star, in the eternal cold and darkness. The most external planet was used as a defensive outpost; there, dug into the ground a hundred meters deep, was a USF base with a long-range detection station. Based on the arrival coordinates, the squadron had surfaced half an astronomical unit from the base, as calculated.

"Report," Corcoran ordered.

He listened to the reports from all four sections, but even before the voices of Tumanov, Hernandez, Pelevich, and Praagh were heard, he knew that everything was in order, as the fear and the alarm were replaced by relief in the crewmembers' mental pulses. The first interstellar probe had been launched to Alpha Centauri three years after the Invasion, after they figured out the Faata drive, and, since then, no ship had disappeared in Limbo; all of them re-appeared at their destinations and without any losses. The mind understood that, but not the emotions: crossing gigantic distances at the speed of thought still seemed like magic and caused fear. The inertia of the human psyche, nothing more... The people of Earth had been going to the stars for only a third of a century and were familiar with a tiny portion of the galactic spiral; a tiny achievement, going by the standards of the more ancient races.

"Navigator, the squadron's position," Corcoran said. "Dupressis, communications! What are you hearing?"

"Dispersion is no higher than calculated, sir," Tumanov reported. "The flagship is three-point-seven megameters away; the _Australia_ is the farthest, about eight megameters. We came through very close!"

A singular glyph flashed by above the panel, then two more after a pause.

"Red Alert is canceled," Praagh said. "The flagship is ordering us to close to point-two megameters."

"Pilot, execute," Corcoran ordered, and the ship shuddered slightly, engaging her gravity drives. "The crew can exit the cocoons. Communications! Camille, did you fall asleep? I don't hear a report!"

"Sorry, sir, I was re-calibrating the channels, there is some slight interference." Junior Lieutenant Dupressis was young, but he knew his business and distinguished himself through his zeal. "On the primary channel, Commodore Vrba is talking to the base; the secondary and ternary channels are full of orders, instructions, and personal letters for the garrison and the settlers. Based on the information from the base, everything is calm here. Do you want to listen?"

"No. All is quiet on the Shipka Pass, and thank God for that," Corcoran muttered in Russian. Then he glanced at the timer at the bottom of the command console and added, "Lieutenant Commander Praagh, I am relieving you. Bai Ling, you will take Santini's post, Dupressis, stay at communications. As per the flight roster, we'll be here for forty-two hours.

"No liberty, sir?" came the cyberneticist Linder's raspy voice.

"No, Sigurd. You can chill on Gonwana."

A heavy sigh came from the communicator.

"Too bad! I've never been to Baal."

"No need to feel sorry, my friend," Tumanov said, getting up. "This isn't your Sweden with pines and oaks; they've got three twigs growing in the sand, and even those are fenced off to avoid being trampled by accident."

That was true. It would be many centuries before the deserts of Baal were covered in vegetation.

Lying on the cot in the Captain's small quarters, Paul Corcoran slept and saw dreams. They started well: he was driving with Vera and the girls to Sloboda, the so-called "Smolensk Switzerland", where blue lakes with crystal-clear water could be found among the mountains and the pine trees, where people enjoyed themselves on the sandy beaches and each footpath had three vending machines with beer, ice cream, and soda. He had taken such a trip, about five years ago, when he was promoted to commander and given thirty days of liberty after the flight to Astarte... The girls, Nadya and Lyuba, both fitting lengthwise on the back seat of the glider: Nadya had just turned four, and Lyuba was three... They were driving down the road between the firs and the pines, but Corcoran wasn't looking at the road, either staring at Vera's cornflower blue eyes or turning back to the girls, admiring their mischievous faces, and his heart was so clear and peaceful, so good, and no gloomy thoughts bothered him. Not of Uncle Pavel, who had been strong in spirit but weak in health, not of the escort car following them, not even of his own cursed blood and his own cursed talents, for Vera's face reflected what was on her mind: smile and happiness. He couldn't read anything else... And he himself was happy. Maybe not entirely human, but he could still be happy! Especially since everything important and dear was with him: Vera, Nadezhda, and Lyubov [The names translate to "Faith", "Hope", and "Love"]!

Suddenly, the lowercase "d" dream was interrupted and a capital "D" Dream began. He was in a huge city, among panicking crowds; the people, similar in appearance to humans but wearing unfamiliar clothes, as if made up of silver ribbons and bright shreds, were rushing around a square, or some sort of area that looked like a square. It was large, almost boundless, but it was still unable to fit the people continuing to arrive, like sea waves being pushed by the tide. Somewhere far off, on the perimeter of the square, he saw tall towers of buildings, those same ones, not built from stone, metal, or glass, but seemingly cast entirely out of plastic. The people were running, dashing, scurrying from these hulks, crushing and pushing one another, trying to get to the middle of the square, where a mound was being made of human bodies; those who ended up on the bottom were groaning, suffocating, bleeding out, but, crushing ribs, breaking limbs, new throngs continued to climb up, some with horror, some with a mad vicious persistence or desperation on their distorted faces.

_What is that?.. Why?.._ Corcoran thought, failing to understand the reasons for the fear, or the cause of the running to this place, so open and defenseless under the low gray sky, where there was nowhere to hide and nothing to shield oneself with, except maybe to get under the pile of the trampled and suffocated people. While he was thinking that, the earth under the feet shuddered; once, twice, stronger and stronger, and a glow suddenly flashed in the sky, dull, like clouds smeared across the sky. Its dirty purple cloths swayed, gripping the city, and the tower-like buildings on the square's periphery started to crack and lurch. They were clearly very tall, two or three kilometers in height, and, while falling, were producing tons of debris, which flew from every direction like shrapnel. The crushing, the groans, the screams grew unbearable, the people recoiled from the structures, but it did not save them: the enormous towers started to crumble, the earth shook under their impact, and each fall was accompanied by an eerie inhuman wail of thousands of dying and mutilated people. Corcoran, helpless, crushed by bodies, pulled into one or another side, almost physically felt the horror hovering over the square. The inevitability of death was frightening tenfold, for it was not one person dying, and not even a hundred or a thousand, but an entire people; a whole world was departing into nothingness, the sun was setting on a great civilization, and dark centuries of chaos were coming to replace it.

A powerful blow to the temple, pain below the heart, blood flowing from the throat... Cold, darkness, oblivion...

He groaned and woke up.

Klaus Siebel was sitting next to the cot, bent over, almost touching his chin to his sharp knees. Corcoran's eyes slid past him to the chronometer. It was 0420, Second Navigator Oki Yamaguchi's watch... All was quiet on the frigate... The dreams, over which Corcoran had no power, took him to Earth and other places and times, made him a father and a husband, an observer or a participant of strange and bygone events, but, when opening his eyes, he felt himself a captain. A person responsible for his ship and crew, for the lives of fifteen people. That was important, at least while he was in space.

He sat up, swinging his legs out of the cot, cleared his throat and said, "Yamaguchi, report." His voice was even.

"Nothing new, Captain," came from the vocoder. "At 0347, we received confirmation from the flagship to maintain course. We are continuing to move away from the edge of the system."

Corcoran nodded. It was a little less than a day until the next jump that would take them to Gondwana. He rubbed his temples with his hands, yawned, and stared at the wall. There, above the redundant control panel and the desk with the recording crystals and all sorts of junk, there was a portrait and two large photographs. One of the holographic images displayed his mother and Aunt Yo, the other had Vera with their daughters; between those images was his whole life, maybe thirty-five years. As for the portrait, it was painted, and Uncle Pavel looked down at Corcoran from it, the way he remembered him two years before his death. There was another portrait, an official one, in parade uniform with all his awards, in the frigate's wardroom, but Corcoran did not like it. Uncle Pavel was a lot closer than Commodore Litvin, astronaut, marine, hero.

Siebel moved on the narrow seat, raised his head, asked, "Feeling heavy, Paul?"

"Heavy," Corcoran admitted.

"Is it one of _those_ Dreams?"

"Yeah. I think I was in an Eclipse."

"First or Second?"

Corcoran shrugged.

"How should I know, Klaus?! There was a city with very tall buildings, which were falling and breaking into fountains of shards. People tried to save themselves on a square, in an open space, but in vain; the buildings crushed them, and these shards... Have you ever seen a swarm volley? Very similar, but on a bigger scale."

"Were there a lot of people?"

Approximating the size of the square and the height of the buildings on the horizon, Corcoran frowned darkly.

"Millions! Between five and ten."

"Then it was the First Eclipse," Siebel said with a confident expression. "The Phase following it had a demographic decline. Cities with populations in the millions no longer existed."

The history of the Faata race was known from the information received by Litvin during his captivity on the alien ship. Very fragmented data, having come not from living beings, not from Yo, who was virtually unfamiliar with the concept of history, but from a quasi-sentient biocomputer, which was controlling the enormous starship. But the USF experts still had a general idea. It was known that the progress of civilization on the Faata homeworld had been interrupted twice by global cataclysms, Eclipses using their terminology, which were separated by a time period of five to eight centuries. The final disaster, the Second Eclipse, had taken place two millennia ago, and, among the long-lived Faata, there were probably witnesses to that planetary tragedy.

Siebel chewed his dry bloodless lips.

"The First Eclipse... two and a half or three thousand years... Curious! You thought that the memories were fading, but that information is from a very distant ancestor."

"Not necessarily," Corcoran countered, snapping the jumpsuit's clasps. "Maybe the ancestor isn't distant but long-lived. Yo, for example, had said that Intermediary Iveh was about two thousand years old."

Saying that, he grimaced; the last thing he wanted was to include Iveh among his ancestors. Siebel, as usual, understood him without words and curled his thin lips in a smile.

"There had been no long-lived people in-between the Eclipses, and at least fifteen generations changed in the five to eight centuries. No, Paul, these are distant memories, very distant. Your brain–"

Corcoran stood up, slid his cot in, and angrily waved his hand.

"Screw my brain! Why don't you tell me why they huddled in that damned square? I understand, they wanted to stay far from the buildings, but they could've run away into the fields, meadows, forests, anywhere in the countryside. Why did they go to the square?"

Siebel, the logger and interpreter of his Dreams, shook his head.

"Forests, meadows, fields... No such landscape details remained prior to the Eclipse! There was a city, a city on two continents in the temperate zone, while the equatorial landmass was planted full of grass to keep them from dying of hunger. Very tall grass, with a high protein content, raw material for artificial food."

"How do you know that, Klaus?" Corcoran asked, then waved his hand and started putting on his boots. "Whatever, you know better..."

Siebel only smiled enigmatically. He really did know better. As an officer of the USF Secret Service, as well as a doctor of psychology and linguistics of the Research Corps, he had been working on the Faata for exactly as long as Corcoran had been alive. He knew about them everything that could have been extracted from Litvin's messages and studies of the starship's remains, from Yo's interrogations and the dissections of the corpses, those few bodies who had not been smeared on the bulkheads during the disaster in the Antarctic. He even knew the Faata language and spoke it at least as good as Corcoran, not counting the psychic component, of course. Siebel didn't seem to possess telepathy. Although, if he was being completely honest, Corcoran wasn't certain about that.

"What did you see besides the city and the dying people?"

"Vera," he answered with a smile and looked at the photo. "Vera and my girls. A sunny day, a forest road, and the glider we're in. Vera is wearing something lilac to match her eyes, Lyoba and Nadya are in yellow dresses, like a pair of dandelions... But that has nothing to do with it, Klaus. That's mine."

"Everything here is yours, and everything is related," Siebel muttered, also looking at the picture. "The Dreams that come from your Faata ancestors are valuable information, as for the personal... well, what you consider personal... that's a sign of your stability. Mental stability, I mean. The love for your wife and children, for your mother, the sense of gratitude and friendship…" He raised his face to Litvin's portrait. "You have normal dreams and normal reactions, Paul. Hmm… human ones, not like a Faata."

Corcoran's smile faded slightly.

"Thanks, Klaus, you've calmed me down; I guess I'm not a monster after all. By the way, I also feel a sense of gratitude and friendship towards you."

"Eit t'tesi," Siebel said in the Faata language. "I'm glad."


	3. Chapter 2

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (Ответный удар) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Chapter 2**

**Paul Richard Corcoran**

**Two months after the Invasion plus the entire life. Lunar Base hospital, August, 2088.**

"Ahhh! Ahhhh!"

"Push, dear, push… there you go… I can see the head…"

"Ahhhhh!"

"I think we can avoid the C-section, Dr. Straub."

"Yes, Dr. Gromov. She's lean but powerfully built. She is a Space Fleet marine officer, after all… Nurse, more tissues! Here and here! I said here!"

"Ahhhh!"

"Nurse, why are your hands shaking? Haven't you seen a woman give birth before?"

"Not like this, Dr. Straub! Without water, without the KR system, without stalumine, without an epidural, without—"

"Nurse, shut up!"

"Come on, Straub… Monica's right, women haven't been giving birth like that for over seventy years. Except, maybe, in China or India…"

"Gromov, you too shut up! Do you know how stalumine or epidural would affect the baby? This particular baby? Haven't you been cleared for information? Have you forgotten whose boy this is?"

"A normal kid, by all the indicators of the prenatal examination."

"We'll see in twenty years if he's normal or not. Push, dear… we're almost there…"

"Aahhh! Ahhhhh!"

"Like that… a little more… Excellent! Popped out like a champagne cork!"

"Aah-oh…"

"Nurse… Monica, I'm talking to you!.. Cut the umbilical cord, then send it for tests! Gromov, give her a sedative, let her sleep. Jeanne, wrap the child and put him on the scale!"

"N-no, Doctor… d-don't want to sleep… son… give m-me my son… ohhh…"

"You'll have plenty of time to play with him, my dear. Sleep! Like that… Jeanne, weight!"

"Four-point-two kilograms, Dr. Straub. Such a wonderful baby! Look, he's smiling!"

"Come on, let's drop the sentimentality! Let me take a look at him… Looks like a completely normal kid… What do you think, Dr. Gromov?"

"Two arms, two legs, ten fingers, ten toes, one head, and… well… everything else a boy ought to have… Obviously not a freak. I would even say cute. Gray eyes, his mother's. Doesn't look like he got anything from the Faata."

"Have you even seen those Faata?"

"I have, Dr. Straub. The bodies in pictures, and the living on the transmission from Timokhin's ships. Their eyes are completely different, the iris is silvery and fills the eyeball, dark hair and…"

"Well, it's too early to talk about hair. Externally, everything appears to be in order, but I'd like to look at the internal organs."

"Want to do a scan?"

"Yes, that would be good. Jeanne, take him to the device. A moment, colleagues… the nurses and you, Dr. Gromov… I'd like to remind you all of the papers all four of us signed and that we are not simply medics but USF servicemen and women. Today, we assisted Lieutenant Abigail McNeil in giving birth. The father of the child is Lieutenant Richard Corcoran, now deceased. That is all that we need to know."

* * *

**Lunar Base hospital, August, 2088, several days later**

"My little sunshine, my darling…" Kiss, kiss kiss. "Hungry…"

"Hold his head, Abby. Your milk is good, high-fat. He fills himself fast."

"Yes, Nurse Jeanne. He's lovely, right?"

"Of course, girl, of course. A wonderful baby! I know what I'm talking about. I have three… three sons and two granddaughters from the eldest one."

"And where are they?"

"The middle one serves on the _Barracuda_, the youngest is on the _Orion_, and the eldest did not join the Space Fleet. He's an artist. Was an artist…"

"Why was, Nurse Jeanne?"

"He died, Abby. Just recently… Him, his wife, and my little granddaughters… Lord, receive their innocent souls… All of them were killed, Abby, when a Faata ship exploded over Liège…"

"Don't cry, Nurse Jeanne, please, don't cry… Look, he's smiling at you… My son…"

* * *

**Smolensk, 2089, homestead in the Holmy neighborhood**

"Pavel, he's coming to you… look how well he's walking… and not to Yo… You recognize Uncle Pavel and Aunt Yo, don't you? Yes, you do!"

"Yay. Uncle Pasha, Aunt O. Pick up! Aunt O!"  
"Does he want me to pick him up?"

"Yes, Yo. He likes you. You're very beautiful!"

"He is warm… the skin is so smooth… and the smell… he smell like, what is drunk… don't tell me, Pavel, I will remember… yes, milk… He smells like milk. Remarkable!"

"You're surprised, Yo? Why? You've seen kids before, right?"

"I have, but I have never held them before. And then, they were… how do you say?.. yes, other people's children. I couldn't touch them. I know that people are allowed to touch only their children or those they know well. That is the custom on Earth."

"What about your people?"

"I have not seen children on the New Worlds."

"Even when you were little?"

There was a pause, then, "Abby, let Yo play with the boy. Here, in the sandbox… I'd like to take a walk. Show me your garden. Cherries… they're cherries, right! Look how they bloom!"

"They're plums, Pavel, not cherries. The cherries are behind the house."

"Let's go there."

"Why are you leading me away?"

"I want to tell you something. Don't ask Yo about children. The Bino Faata have no children, only offspring. The next generation of t'ho, workers, warriors, or pilots."

"But aren't offspring children?"

"Not entirely. I told you not to be deceived by the external similarities between them and us. The physiological similarities are great, down to the cellular level, but their world is organized differently, and there is no place in it for children. They believe that childhood is unproductive, that children provide nothing, only consume, taking a lot of resources away from society. Besides, children are vulnerable. The most vulnerable link in the biology of any race, the first to die in case of wars, diseases, natural disasters, and this vulnerability is proportional to the time of childhood. The first to die during the Eclipses were children, and the gene pool died with them… With that, the longer the time to reach maturity, the more cost is required do protect the new generation. It's irrational, do you understand?"

"But can it be any different? For us, for people? The Faata are people, after all!"

"It can be. They practice artificial insemination, and the ksa females, a special caste, carry the fetus to term in five to six weeks. Very quickly, thanks to wave emissions, like what happened to you on their ship. Then the baby is placed in an incubator… not really an incubator, more like a device for accelerated physiological development. Yo could not describe this machinery. She only knew that she came out of it an adult person about a year after being born. Mature, capable of speaking the language, and even possessing some professional skills… That is the entirety of her childhood. For her, a child is a miracle of miracles."

"And her… I mean you both… you and her…"  
"No, Abby, no, we're not going to have any children. Her t'ho caste is infertile."

"But infertility can be cured."

"It's not a disease, not the infertility of a woman from Earth, Abigail, her body simply doesn't produce the necessary gametes. There's nothing that can be done about this, dear. On the Lunar Base and here, on Earth, she'd been examined by the best specialists… very thoroughly, believe me! And that's not even the point."

"It's not? You're scaring me, Pavel! What is it?"

"The point is that the Faata world is rational to the end. Old age is just as unproductive as youth, and so the t'ho don't live long." He made a long, long pause. Then, "I don't know how long she has left."

* * *

**Smolensk, 2093, homestead in the Holmy neighborhood**

"Paul, say, _t'taia orr n'uk'uma sirend'agi patta_."

"_Tetaia orrr nukuma sirentahi pata_… Is that right, Aunt Yo?"

"No, child, no. It is _t'taia_ not _tetaia_, _n'uk'uma_ not _nukuma_… You have such a wonderful flexible tongue, click it in the right place. Listen once again, _t'taia orr n'uk'uma sirend'agi patta_… Now repeat."

"_T'taia orrr n'uk'uma sirent'agi patta_!"

"Much better. _Orr_, _orr_, _orr_… No need to roll the sound too much. And the ending of the word _sirend_ is sonorous: _sirend_, _sirend_, _sirend'agi_. It is better if you sing instead of speaking. Let's sing together!"

"Yeah, Aunt Yo. _T'taia orr n'uk'uma sirend'agi patta_!"

"Wonderful, my good boy! Do you understand what it means?"

"A sirend came out to the sun and is basking in the warmth of the stones. A sirend is a lizard with a shiny blue skin… it's found on the New Worlds, the ones you told me about…"

"On one of the New Worlds, child. On T'har… It's a world where I used to live."

"Is it farther than Mars?"

"Farther, Paul."

"Farther than Jupiter?"

"Much farther. It's near the Void, at the edge of the galactic arm, and light travels to it for almost two centuries."

"Do you miss it?"

"No. I don't think so… I didn't have anyone close there, and here I have you, and your mom, and Pavel… And Earth is much more beautiful than T'har."

"But I still want to see T'har. When I grow up and become an astronaut, we'll all fly there together: you, me, Uncle Pavel, and Mom."

"I don't think they would be happy to see us, Paul."

"Why?"

"I will explain this to you, but not now, a little later. Right now, we need to speak Faata'liu, so that you understand everything correctly. Do you remember what Faata'liu is?"

"Of course I do. It's the Bino Faata language."

* * *

**Smolensk, September, 2094, homestead in the Holmy neighborhood**

"Mom, why is Uncle Pavel crying?"

"He's not crying, son. There are no tears in his eyes."

"He's crying. I can feel it. Here." A small hand touching his forehead. "You're crying too. Why, Mom?"

A long pause.

"You're probably right, my boy. We're both crying, Uncle Pavel and I. People grieve when those close to them leave, leave forever. I didn't want to tell you… Yo has died. Do you understand what this means?"

"_Kass'iro tan_… I mean, I understand and I don't. Old people die, but Aunt Yo was young and so beautiful… How could she have died?"

"You know, Paul, that she was not human… We live for seventy, or eighty, or even a hundred years, but Yo couldn't live that long. She was a Faata."  
"But she told me that the Faata live for a very long time and never get old. Is that not true?"

"There are different Faata, dear, just like there are different people on Earth. The Faata like Yo don't have long lives."

Silence.

"So she will never come to us? Never-ever? She won't teach me, speak Faata'liu with me, tell me about T'har, the New Worlds, and the big ship that brought her to Earth? I don't want that! I want her to live! Is that so hard, to just live?"

"There are things beyond our control, Paul. We need to accept them and bear the sorrow with patience and bravery. Look at Uncle Pavel… look, he's sitting on a bench in our garden, his eyes are sad, but you won't see tears in them. He's a strong man, our Uncle Pavel…"

"But there is darkness inside him. I feel it, I know… No tears, but he's crying…" A pause. "Can I go to him, Mom?"

"Go, son."

* * *

**Smolensk, October, 2094, homestead in the Holmy neighborhood**

"Paul, this is Mr. Klaus Siebel from the USF. He will—"

"Forgive me, ma'am, it's just Klaus. And you are Paul… Paul Richard Corcoran… You know, you look very much like your mom. You have such an interesting room… so many pictures, and all of them holographic… I see Captain Litvin on them… here he is on Mercury, and here in the Asteroid Belt… Where is that?"

"On Ajax. There are two suns there, Mr. Klaus, a green and a red one."

"Call me Klaus, Paul. I am, of course, older than you, but not by much, only about twenty years. Nothing to speak of, wouldn't you agree? Your room is nice… and the windows facing the garden… and there are asters blooming in the garden… Tell me, why are these two pictures turned off, this one and that one?"

"Mom says it's the custom, to keep them turned off for forty days. Aunt Yolanda is on them. She died, Klaus."

"You wanted to say Yo, right?"

"I wanted to say Yolanda, since that is what everyone called here, except for Mom and me and Uncle Pavel. But you're from the USF, so you know that she was Yo."

"I do. Turn on the pictures, please. Do it for me, for five minutes."

Pause.

"Beautiful… It's too bad she didn't live longer with you…"

"She didn't live here. She and Uncle Pavel have their own home."

"I misspoke, Paul. I wanted to say, here on Earth. Was she your friend?"

"She was, Klaus."

"Do you have other friends? Who are they?"

"Kolya. He lives in that house over there, with the tower. Do you see it, Klaus? Riiight there, over the trees… There are also Seryoga and Petka. They're brothers, but Petka is little, and Seryoga and I will go to school together, that's what Mom said. Not soon, though… in another year… almost…"

"But you won't forget what you've learned from Yo? Faata'liu, for example?"

"I will try not to forget, but no one besides Aunt Yo knows Faata'liu, not even Uncle Pavel. Seryoga… I wanted to teach Seryoga, but he says everything wrong and can't click his tongue. And now, when Aunt Yo is gone…"

"… Now I'm here. I know a little Faata'liu and can click. Ts, ts, ts… Do you hear? Do you know why I came?"

"Why, Klaus?"

"I came to talk to you in the language of the Bino Faata. We need to speak it, you and I, or we will forget it, and that would simply not do. One needs to know the language of one's enemy… enemies or allies, depending on how fate decides. Do you understand?.. I can see that you don't, but you will in time. You and I will speak, Paul. Of course, I can't replace Yo, I'm not attractive in the least, and I don't look like a Faata, but I know much about them. I will tell you all I know. And we… maybe we can become friends."

Silence. Almost unconsciously, a telepathic probe touched the other person's mind, clung for a moment, and recoiled.

This Klaus Siebel was a strange one… Strange, but he didn't appear to bear him ill will… He wanted to talk… he really did…

"_Eit t'tesi_," the boy said in the Faata language. "I am glad."

* * *

**Mallorca, summer of 2099, children's sports camp Green Scouts near Alcúdia Bay**

"Paul? Your name is Paul Corcoran? So, that's Paolo then. I'm Jose Gutiérrez from Barcelona."

"Spanish?"

"Hah, Spanish! I'm Catalan, Paolo! My grandfather says that we're the real Iberians, not like those…" Making a contemptuous gesture. "Where are you from? Sweden?"

"Why do you think so?"

"All Swedes have red hair, and you're red."

"I'm from Russia, Jose."

"Hah, liar! Russians don't have names like that! You're definitely Swedish! Why, is it bad being a Swede?"

"Probably not, but I'm not Swedish. My mother is Irish, father was Austrian, and I live in Russia, in Smolensk."

"Why? And why did you say that your father _was_ Austrian?"

"Because he died, and Mom decided that we'd be better off in Smolensk. Uncle Pavel is there."

"Your new father?"

"No, my father's friend, Captain Paul Litvin. He's now in command of the _Dresden_."

"Wow! A Space Fleet captain, yes? I've read about the Invasion… Is he _the_ Litvin? Crown of Glory, Purple Heart, Order of the Comet and… and…"

"He's that Litvin, Jose. He was a marine… and Mom, and my father… They flew on the _Lark_."

"Marines, wow! I saw this morning how you were jumping in that… what do you call it… yeah, the weightless unit! Cool! You got that from your parents, right? The marines? As for mine… my folks have always dealt in wine. Grandfather had, and my great-grandfather, and my dad is doing it now… I don't want to. When I grow up," his eyes grew wide, "I'll go to Pluto. Those… what do you call them… Lo'ona Aeo, right, came there! They need mercenaries, fighters! And I—"

"Jose, why become a mercenary? Is it that bad on Earth?"

"It's good. Good but boring! And grandfather says, we Catalans are a restless lot…"

* * *

**Smolensk, winter of 2102, Captain Litvin's office in his home**

"Why have we met here, Klaus?"

"Because I need to tell you something important, Paul, and this is the most appropriate place. Your mother and Uncle Pavel also think so. Miss Abby, your mom, is very afraid, she doesn't know how you will react… Maybe you'll decide you need to be alone. There are things that a man must deal with on his own, and you are already a man, Paul, you're fourteen. If you want to stay here, here is the password and the key. Commodore Litvin left them for you."

"Klaus… don't be upset, Klaus… if I should learn something important, then why you?.. Why not Mom?.. Why not Uncle Pavel?.."

"Why do you think?"

Silence, only the crackling of the logs in the fireplace is heard.

"I think that you're a specialist, Klaus. A psychologist. You serve in the USF and study the Faata. You probably know more about them than anyone…" There was a pause. "Is our conversation about the Bino Faata?"

"Right conclusion, my boy. The Bino Faata, Abby McNeil, your mother, Pavel Litvin, Richard Corcoran, and the days they spent as prisoners on the alien ship. And those curious moments and amusing personalities like Gunther Voss, the savior of Earth… Here, on this disk, is a complete report about what happened, and you will look it over after I leave. But first we will talk… Tell me, have you noticed anything strange about yourself?"

"Strange? No, Klaus… I don't think so."

"No? I'll give you a hint, Paul. Does it surprise you that you speak Faata'liu?"

"So do you."

"I had surgery, complex surgery on my larynx. You see, Paul, Bino Faata vocal cords, palate, and tongue are a little different, and the people of Earth are simply incapable of mastering the necessary pronunciation. Only you and I, if we discount the special translation vocoders… But that's not the most important thing… not for you. The important thing is this. I've noticed that you catch the meaning of an unfinished phrase, sometimes even an unspoken thought. In the past several years, when you hit puberty, it started happening more and more frequently… Have you ever thought how you can do that? Don't shudder, there's nothing wrong about it. Such is your gift, my boy."

"Klaus, now I understand what you're talking about." A pause. "Klaus… I'm scared, Klaus…"

"There is no need to fear. You're not a freak, Paul, this is sort of like a hereditary gift. Come on, focus, look into my mind, straight into my brain… How many neurons does old Klaus have? Can you find even five?.. There you go, now you're smiling…"

"Because I'm scared even more, Klaus. A hereditary gift? Why hereditary?"

"Because Richard Corcoran was not your father. I will explain… I will explain now… you just pay attention…"

* * *

**Smolensk, winter of 2102, homestead in the Holmy neighborhood**

"Mom, Klaus told me…"

"I know what Klaus told you, and I don't want to talk about it. You're my son, Paul, flesh of my flesh, blood of my blood… That is enough."

"Of course, Mom. But I will still ask… no, not about what they did to you on the ship, something else. Klaus gave me a report, and it talked about a Metamorph, that Gunther Voss… Is that true? Have you seen him yourself?"

A sigh of relief.

"I have. With my own eyes."

"Tell me!"

"Uncle Pavel knows more. When he returns—"

"When he returns, I'll ask him, but you must tell me too! Where did he come from, this Voss guy, and what did he look like? What did he do? Why did he…"

* * *

**Smolensk, March, 2105, 1****st**** Smolensk School, 12****th**** grade**

"… If we turn to Russian literature of that period, we will easily notice the tendencies of disappointment and nihilism, which are explained by the general situation in the country at the end of the 20th and the start of the 21st centuries. The collapse of a great nation, a sharp decline of the economy and the impoverishment of the population on the one hand, and on the other, illiterate nouveaux riches, lazy officials, and greedy oligarchs, who threw a feast in the middle of a plague; that is how we see Russia of those years, which is, of course, reflected in the literary process. If we turn to the works of such writers as…"

"Pasha, hey, Pasha…"

"What, Seryoga?"

"Have you seen the new girl? The one who came to 9th grade?"

"Which girl?"

"Vera Kovaleva. I hit her with a scanner… a few times… quietly… Here, I'll send the pics to your pocketpute… [_Pocketpute is a pocket computer, combining the functionality of a phone and a medical diagnostician._]

"They're gonna catch and throw us out. Did you forget about the conter [_Conter (AKA the Ear, or Elephant Ear) is a device tracking the ambient noises in the background of the primary sound signals. The name comes from the French word 'ecouter' (to listen); the device is used in educational institutions, and its various modifications are employed in espionage, show business, transportation, and industry._]?

"…The period of decline that we will examine today, continued until the second or third decade of the 21st century and gave birth, in particular, to a special genre of horror literature. If we turn, but example, to the novel _No_…"

"Forget about the conter, I recalibrated it a bit. Take a look at the girl, Pasha! Look at the second pic! I took that from the bottom, when she was coming up the stairs… Look at those legs!"

"She's still young! Barely fifteen years!"

"So, we're not old men yet. I'm not, at least. Which is why—"

"What did you do with the conter, Seryoga? They already got us! How did you mess with it, you moron?"

There was an Interruption in the lecture transmission.

"Unit seven! Semyonov and Corcoran! Out of the auditorium!"

"Olga Vasilyevna, we—"

"Semyonov, I said out, that means out! I can see what you have on your screens! And if you once again dare…"

* * *

**Smolensk, May, 2105, homestead in the Holmy neighborhood**

"Mom, this is Vera."

"Hello, dear. I'm Abby. Are you studying with Paul?

"No, Aunt Abby, I'm only in 9th grade. Biology major."

"Yes, of course. You still…" a pause, "still so young."

"Mom, you wanted to say, still a child."

"Paul, it's not what I wanted to say, but what I said. Vera is not a child. A young woman, that is more precise. And a very pretty one. I'm surprised she noticed such a red-haired fool."

"Thank you, Aunt Abby, I'm fifteen, but I will try to grow up faster."

"No need to hurry, girl. We all grow up, then we get old, and there's nothing to be done about that… Do you like our place?"

"Very much! Such a wonderful garden! And the lilac… I love the smell of lilac."

"Paul, you could have cut a bouquet for Vera. You must have heard that girls like it when you give them flowers?.. Come into the house, dear. Would you like some tea?"

* * *

**Smolensk, July, 2105, evening, birch grove in the Holmy neighborhood**

"When are you leaving, Pavel?"

"The day after tomorrow, my dove."

"To Baikonur?"

"To Baikonur."

A heavy sigh.

"So far away… You'll forget me…"

"It's more likely that I'll forget that the sun rises in the morning…"

The sound of a kiss.

* * *

**USF Space Academy at Baikonur, August, 2105**

"Cadeeets, atteeeeen-hut! You, ginger, shut your trap and no smiling! Repeat again who I am!"

"Sergeant Cox, sir!"

"I can't hear you, maggots!"

"Serrrgeant Cox, sirrrr!"

"That's better… Yes, I'm Sergeant Brian Cox, the devil himself, and for the next six years, I will be a pain in your ass. I will make real men out of you! Marines and warriors! I… Ginger, I told you to shut your trap and no smiling!"

"Permission to speak, sir! A question, sir!"

"What do you want?"

"We have three girls in our squad, sir. Are you going to make real men out of them too?"

A menacing tense silence. Then, "Riiight… I see we have a smart-ass here… On the one hand, not bad; you're being trained for the space marines, not the army. On the other, only fifth-years are allowed to be smart. Fifth, and not a day earlier! You, ginger bastard! What's your name?.."

"Paul Richard Corcoran, sir!"

"Uh-huh, so, Paul Richard… What do you see, Paul Richard, right there, on the ground?"

"A cigarette butt, sir!"

"Exactly, a cigarette butt. It needs to be buried. Tonight, at 0300, you will take a shovel and dig a hole by 0600: one square meter in diameter and three deep. Put the cigarette butt in the center, sit on it in the lotus position and wait for me. And God help you if the hole turns out to be too shallow! Got it?"

"Sir, yes, sir!"

* * *

**USF Space Academy at Baikonur, September, 2105**

"This, boys and girls, is a symbiotic combat suit. You need to be able to put it on in under a minute. And this is a PT-43M, modified plasma thrower, pattern 43, the most powerful handheld weapon we got. Heavy, Pavlova? That's okay, you'll get used to it! And now, you…"

* * *

**USF Space Academy at Baikonur, February, 2106**

"You, you, and you! And also you, Bayramov! Did you assholes just puke? You fail your zero-g test. Get your things!"

* * *

**USF Space Academy at Baikonur, March, 2106**

"I am Captain Dzandaria, your astronavigation instructor. Of course, making navigators out of you will be like making a kebab out of shit, but you need to know the basics. Yes, you do, gentlemen! And so, let's start with the coordinate system…"

* * *

**USF Space Academy at Baikonur, May, 2106**

"Weeell, dear cadets… Is everyone who hasn't yet been kicked out here? Everyone, I see… Well, then let's get to the duties. Dickinson, Astakhova, Barré, Tuang, to the galley. Kleimenov, Dembski, Pavlova, Reed, you'll take care of the lawn by the barracks, and I want to see all the blades of grass line up! May grass is so tender… Breaux and Larsen, you're at Lieutenant Romanetskiy's disposal, he needs loaders. You, Sazhin, go to the medical unit and scrub the floors… Weeell, what's left? Ah, two latrines, for men and women! Well, that, as usual, is for the smartest among us. Paul Richard Corcoran!"

"Here, Sergeant Cox, sir!"

"I want those tiles to shine like a cruiser's armor!"

"Sir, yes, sir!"

* * *

**USF Space Academy at Baikonur, May, 2106**

"Dear Mom and Vera!

You remember, of course, that we are not allowed any communications with our loved ones during the first year, but Klaus came to visit me today, and I begged him to give you this disk. Don't worry, I'm all right, I'm cheerful, healthy, and haven't been transferred to the ground-pounders. We're living well, and they couldn't care for us any better. Everyone here is really nice, especially Sergeant Cox; he's over fifty, and you, Mom, probably remember him and can tell Vera how kind and attentive instructor he is. I would really like to see you, but we're not allowed any liberty this summer. Please give my regards to Uncle Pavel, when he returns from Astarte, and tell him that I…"

* * *

**USF Space Academy at Baikonur, 2107**

"Cadet Corcoran! You have dealt with the glyph perception test much too quickly. Did you bypass the computer's security to get the answer?

"No, sir! That would be wrong!"

"Well-well… Sometimes, I think that you take the results right out of my head."

"That's closer to the truth, sir."

"You can make jokes later, cadet. Start on the next problem."

* * *

**USF Space Academy at Baikonur, 2108**

"Let's get to know one another, cadets: I'm your piloting instructor. We're going to start by flying a Kite. It's an old but reliable machine, you can land with it on Mars and on Venus. I'm assuming you're familiar with the piloting theory…"

* * *

**Venus, airspace above Dead Man's Plateau, 2109**

"Reverse thrust, cadet! Fly towards 3 o'clock! And don't get too close to that cloud! Right, that's good… fly smoothly now, don't rush… Don't jerk your arms or legs, there are no buttons or switches here, you've got a cocoon and a contact helmet. Now faster! Faster! Not afraid? I can see that you're not afraid, just cautious. That's good. You've flown on Earth, Mars, and Mercury… I remember, you flew well… But this is Venus, damn it! Anyone's brains will melt and hands will shake here… Now go up! Steeper! No need to get blasted by lightning! Get away from this stinking plateau! Up, up, up! Go! I'm not intervening, I'm not an instructor, just your passenger, or a gunner with a hole in my gut. I'm bleeding out, understand? If you save me, get to the orbital base, you'll be a pilot and not a cadet. Come on, Paul, come on! I'm not intervening, kid…"

* * *

**USF Space Academy at Baikonur, head of the Academy's reception hall, 2110**

"Squad, atten-hut! Commodore, fifth-year squad B is ready for instruction! The ranks have twelve soldiers and Sergeant Cox!"

"I see, Lieutenant. Cadets, at ease! Today, at 0525, Raj Ali separatists have attacked the Red Cross mission and the refugee camp in Lucknow [_Lucknow is a city in North-East India, in the state of Uttar Pradesh._]. The marines of the cruiser _Jeanne d'Arc_ have repelled the attack, scattered the bandits and are in pursuit. They are leaving into the jungle, to the Nepalese border, the size of their forces is up to two hundred rifles. You will be dropped here and here, in two groups under the command of Lieutenant Romanetskiy and Sergeant Cox. Your mission is to flank the gang, cut them off from the foothills, and destroy, working in conjunction with the marines from the _Jeanne_. Lieutenant!"

"Yes, sir!"

"Here, take the pute, it has the charts and the data you need. Communicate with me and the cruiser when you arrive to the site, then at every half-hour. Oh, one more thing… Cadets! Eight members of the mission were killed, and there are casualties among the refugees, at least two dozen. I am reminding you that this is not a drill, it's a combat operation."

* * *

**Jungles in the state of Uttar Pradesh, upper reaches of the Rapti River, 2110, 42 hours after the start of the operation**

"Where am I? Hrr… Where am I? Where am I, damn it?"

"On my back, Sergeant. Glad you woke up."

"You, Corcoran? Where are the rest?"

"Four are behind me. Sazhin's dead, Tuang's wounded but can move. You… you, sir, had your foot cut off by a laser. And a concussion probably too… They hit you and Vanya Sazhin with an RPG. Vanya died instantly… Barré and Larsen are carrying the body. Astakhova is covering them."

"Hrr… Why are you without a suit?"

"It died. They've got throwers. Melted the knee joint, no time to fix it."

"Leave me, Corcoran!"

"Can't, Sergeant. We're in a swamp. Take a wrong step and you'll drown. Does your leg hurt? It shouldn't, we treated it with vitaspray and injected an analgesic."

"Leave me, I'm ordering you! Leave me and the body! Get out of here! Hrr… Get out! I'm orde…"

"Corcoran!"

"Yeah, Tuang."

"He lost consciousness." A pause. "What are we going to do, Corcoran?"

"We'll cross the swamp, hide in the greenery on the other side and shoot all the bastards. They're following us, but they can't hide in the swamp. It's flat here."

"They've got throwers, Paul."

"So do we. They won't cross here!" A pause. "Whoa, our sergeant is heavy… At least he's alive… Who else is going to be kicking our butts for another six months?"

* * *

**Smolensk, summer of 2111, birch grove in the Holmy neighborhood**

"Pavel, Pavel, honey! Ooh! Pavel, my love!"

* * *

**Smolensk, summer of 2111, homestead in the Holmy neighborhood**

"Is it serious between you, Paul?"

"As serious as we can get, Klaus!"

"Does your mother approve?"

"Both Mother and Uncle Pavel."

"They approve then… Hmm…"

"You think a monster like me shouldn't start a family?"

"You're not a monster, Paul, you're a person with a special gift, and that complicates the situation. What can you hide from a woman you're sharing your bed with? Nothing, almost nothing, I assure you. Her love and devotion are the guardians of your secrets. Are you certain they will never dry up?.. No, don't hurry with the answer, only time provides the right answers. Are they sending you to the _Taiga_? Serve there for a few years, then decide. Decide together. Let her realize that an astronaut's wife does not lead a happy life; you'll be with her one month out of six."

"You're right, Klaus, right as usual. But let's talk about something else, okay?" A pause. "I heard the Lo'ona Aeo want to build a city on Pluto or a space station… Maybe, they are those same Metamorphs or Proteids? Gunther Voss… you remember Emissary Voss?.. could he be one of them?"

A dry laugh.

"Not one of them. Definitely not one of them!"

* * *

**USF Lunar Base, the cruiser **_**Taiga**_**, captain's reception, 2111**

"Sir, Junior Lieutenant Paul Richard Corcoran. Reporting due to being assigned to the cruiser's marine pilot complement."

"At east, Lieutenant. I see you have the Cross of Valor… What did you get it for?"

"Carried my wounded commander out of combat, sir."

"Well, that's impressive. One moment, I will read over your paperwork… All right, everything is in order. Head to deck F and report to Commander Gulyga. He is our lead marine pilot. Serve well, Junior Lieutenant!"

"Thank you, sir!"

* * *

**Near-Earth space, aboard the cruiser **_**Taiga**_**, communication session with Earth, 2113**

"Mom, can you hear me, Mom?"

"I hear and see you, Paul. My dear, you look like you've lost weight."

"It's okay, you'll fatten me up again. I'm coming home, Mom, I'm coming! They're sending me to the Navigator School in Málaga… I'll be on Earth for almost two years!"

"I already know, son. Klaus sent us a message… Verochka and me."

"Has she told you anything?"

"She is such a secretive girl, Paul. Doesn't say much, just smiles and blushes."

"We've decided to get married, Mom. We—"

"Enough, Lieutenant, connection broken! Your time is up, and I've got a line of people in the hallway. I hope you've had time to say the important thing."

"No, Thyssen. I haven't said I loved them both."

* * *

**Telemachus System, 22 parsecs from Sol.**

**Aboard the cruiser **_**Genghis Khan**_**, officer wardroom, 2117.**

"Captain on deck! Atten-hut!"

"You can sit, ladies and gentlemen. Second Navigator Corcoran! Message for you, so let me be the first to congratulate you with Lyubov, Paul! Your wife has given birth to a daughter. A second one, I believe?"

"Yes, Kirill Petrovich. Thank you! Thanks, guys! Oh, Nina, don't hug me so tightly, I'm a married man after all… Thanks, Peter, thanks, Marat… Kirill Petrovich, request permission for the occasion?.."

"Granted. Powell, champagne! Paul, can I borrow you for a few words… I have one more piece of news for you: you're on your way to a promotion. First, courses on the Lunar Base, then you'll be the third officer aboard the _Europe_. The captain has such a funny name… Verba… no, Vrba, Karel Vrba. Have you heard about him?"

There was a pause.

"No, Kirill Petrovich. And I will be said to leave the _Genghis Khan_."

"Don't be. First of all, service is service, and second, you know the saying, 'more ships means more friends'? Besides, Vrba is a serious man, and the _Europe_ is the lead ship of a new class. She's not so much a cruiser as an entire planet! There will be other ships like her, so we'll get a whole specialized squadron. Maybe they're prepping it to protect a Lo'ona Aeo sector, but I've heard… hmm… Well, I'll let Vrba tell you about that."

* * *

**Near-Earth space, shipyard DX-51, aboard the cruiser **_**Europe**_**, captain's quarters, 2118.**

"You're only thirty, Corcoran, and you're already the third officer on my ship. You're too young for such a critical assignment. Do you understand that?"

"Yes, sir."

"Do you have any thoughts on this?"

"None, sir."

"Perhaps you think that you're under the patronage of Commodore Litvin? I know he cares for your family and treats you like a son…"

"The latter is correct, but the former is not. Commodore Litvin does not mix service and his personal life. He's not that sort of man, sir."

"He's not, I agree." Rustling of papers. "I have familiarized myself with the description of one operation… Eight years ago, during the disturbance in the Lucknow region, a squad of cadets was deployed there to support the marines. A part of the squad, seven soldiers, encountered the enemy's superior forces, one man was killed, the commander was wounded. You carried him out. Not only that, but you laid an ambush and took out the attacking bandits. It seemed like you knew how many of them there were and where they would go. This is not an isolated case. I have read the reports about your other exploits… A special tactical gift? What do you think, Corcoran?"

"I believe it's a coincidence, sir. Sometimes, I get really lucky."

"Just lucky, right? Well, let's assume that…" More rustling of paper, then some text appeared on the film screen. "I don't have the precise information, Corcoran, but I believe you're familiar with the Faata language."

"Sir, it's a very difficult language, with phonetics virtually impossible for us. I don't believe I can consider myself an expert in this area. I've studied navigation, piloting, system analysis, medicine, human resources, and—"

"Enough, enough, Lieutenant Commander! All right, your attempt at pulling the wool over my eyes, as they used to say in the previous century, was worthy enough. I have familiarized myself with your file, its official version. Here is the copy." More paper rustling. "And here," a nod at the screen, "is another document, received from the USF Secret Service, which has your entire secret genealogy. You owe it and Curator Siebel your rapid promotion." A pause. "They have high expectations for you, Corcoran. When we head to the star systems where the Faata colonies are located…"

A pause, then, "A counterstrike, Captain? Is that what you mean?"

"Yes."

"And what will I have to do?"

"Whatever the situation demands, Corcoran. You and Siebel are our experts, you know the Faata language, worldview, customs. You will be our translators, consultants, intermediaries, and, if necessary, spies in the enemy camp. You will probably be given a ship, a small craft with a contour drive, a frigate or a corvette. When we get close to the Faata New Worlds, you will conduct the initial reconnaissance. In a sense, you will have to lead and direct the forces we send there."

"Besides Siebel and me, there is one more expert, sir. My mother knows little, but Commodore Litvin… He does not know the language, but he had been on the Ship, fought the Faata, even established contact with the quasi-mind and that strange Metamorph creature, Gunther Voss. He–"

"He will be our commander, Corcoran. If he lives long enough and has the strength for the expedition."

"If he lives long enough?"

"You don't think that we'll go there tomorrow, on the _Europe_ alone, do you? Five more ships have been laid down, and their construction, including the shakedown, will take seven to eight years. Commodore Litvin is not a young man anymore, and his health… Well, you know that better than I do."

"I still hope he will be with us. I feel safer with him, Captain."

"I agree with you there. So do I."


	4. Chapter 3

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (Ответный удар) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Chapter 3**

**Silmarri, the Gondwana System**

Corcoran usually dedicated the hour before the start of his watch to walking the ship. It was impossible to walk around the _Europe_, where he'd served for seven years, on his own two legs: each of the twelve decks of the enormous cruiser stretched for at least a kilometer, and they were all packed with people, supplies, weapons, and war machines. Except for the biannual audits, the _Europe_ was never walked; instead, it was observed from the bridge, where a large multifaceted screen showed all the hallways, compartments, and holds of the ship. But the _Commodore Litvin_ was a low-tonnage vessel, allowing for a walk, and, while taking it, listening to the quiet rumbling of the drives, absorbing the emotions and thoughts of the crew, Corcoran felt a sense of unity with his frigate. Sometimes, he even thought that Uncle Pavel was walking somewhere behind him, silent, disembodied, but pleased; Commodore Litvin did indeed participate in this expedition, even if not as a living being. Instead, he had become a fighting unit in the squadron, a ship capable of jumping a hundred light years and dealing a crippling blow.

The walk started with the compartments adjacent to the bridge. Immediately behind it, on the portside, were the long-range communication station and the secondary bridge with the auxiliary controls, on the starboard side were the main gunnery post, connected to the annihilator and all the methods of destruction the frigate possessed. Behind them was the wardroom, the largest room on the ship, not counting the holds, interlocked with the galley, as well as the sanitation and medical units. The crew complement of the ship did not include a doctor, but cyberneticist Sigurd Linder was familiar with the automated medical equipment, and even Corcoran could, when necessary, figure out the resuscitator, the cyber-diagnostician, and the autosurgeon. Past the galley, there was a short hallway with plastic paneling the color of light birch and crew quarters on both sides. It ended in an airlock with the hatch irises that led to the turrets, the exit chambers, and the lower deck, also known as the holds. Beyond the airlock, the hallway looked narrower and poorer, without the paneling hiding the metal, as that part of the ship held the cybernetic equipment, the express analysis lab, the life support system with the recycler and the artificial gravity generator, which didn't require any special attention from the crew. At the very end of the upper deck was one more cubbyhole, the so-called reactor room, or the engineering post, where Sancho Hernandez and Sigurd Linder worked. Beyond the convex bulkhead, reinforced by cermet plates, was the tube of the acceleration shaft, with the planetary drives attached to it from two sides, and the annihilator, looking like an enormous spiraling coil, below. The only way to get there was through the technical hatch, but it, like the reactor room, had more to do with tradition than necessity. The contour drive, powered by any source of energy, from starlight to the unified field of the universe, required virtually no maintenance.

Corcoran spent a few minutes in the reactor room, watching the massive stands of the drive control, lit up by calm green lights. Commodore Litvin, hovering somewhere above his shoulder, smiled approvingly. "Everything is fine here, Uncle Pavel," Corcoran whispered and started slowly walking back to the airlock, where he descended to the lower deck. It was separated into two holds, fore and aft; the latter was meant for cargo and supplies, while the fore hold was filled with launcher containers with a dozen combat robots, data probes, a pair of Peregrine-class fighters, and an all-terrain crawler. Also, there, near a special hatch, was a small battle module, looking like a large rectangular box with a corner cut off, one of the machines that had survived the disaster on the Faata ship. Corcoran could pilot it but with difficulty.

Looking over his arsenal and even touching the powerful pushing rods, he came back up, walked down the quiet hallway, looked at the chronometer tableau in the wardroom and, exactly at 0600, stepped over the threshold of the bridge, where Second Navigator Oki Yamaguchi was keeping watch.

"Captain on the bridge!" Oki announced to himself, and quickly got out of the navigator cocoon. "Reporting, sir: no incidents during my watch." He thought for a moment and added, "not counting the grave memories tormenting the watchman. I stand relieved!"

"You are relieved," Corcoran said, getting into Selina Praagh's seat. It retained a barely-detectable feminine scent, reminding him of Vera and the girls. "So what was tormenting you, Oki? The sight of Sapporo in the snow? A memory of cherry blossoms?"

Oki Yamaguchi, the small, tight Japanese man, as if wound from copper wire, hung his head in sadness. Irony mixed with sorrow, Corcoran sensed.

"When I was young, foolish, and adventurous, I made a mistake, Captain. I did not listen to my honored parent."

Oki was twenty-seven, too young of an age to regret youthful mistakes. _What did he do?.._ Corcoran's thoughts raced. _Burned daddy's kimono with a firecracker? Or cut off the wrong chrysanthemum in his father's garden?_ His telepathic gift was not powerful enough to perceive vague thoughts, and those were the kind usually present in the minds of most people.

"My parent, Commander Oki Saburo, had sent me to the Tokyo Piloting School. Such is the family tradition, even my great-grandfather had finished that school, and all my worthy ancestors then served in the First Fleet of the USF, protecting Japan and the entire planet from the sky. And I," he scratched his ear, "I must be a degenerate. I studied for two years and, when I turned eighteen, ran away to Pluto, to the Lo'ona Aeo. To be a mercenary."

"I'll go to Pluto… Those… what do you call them… Lo'ona Aeo, right, came there! They need mercenaries, fighters!" another voice, still child-like, echoed in Corcoran's ears. How long ago had that been! When?.. And where?.. His memory obediently told him: Mallorca, a quarter of a century ago, a dark-skinned boy named Jose Gutiérrez from Barcelona… It was doubtful that he became a mercenary; probably dealt in wine, like his grandfather and father. But Oki Yamaguchi, descended from pilots and navigators, had managed to get to Pluto.

"How long have you toiled under them?" Corcoran asked, remembering that Oki's personnel file had no record of this episode. "A standard contract? Five years?"

"Three months was enough for me, Captain. One would have probably been enough, but I hesitated… you understand, giri and gimu [_Giri is the sense of duty, gimu are the obligations that need to be fulfilled (Japanese terms)._], the duty of a samurai, et cetera… Then I decided, what duty to the aliens?.. They are not the sons of Amaterasu [_Amaterasu is the sun goddess, the head of the Shinto pantheon, the progenitor of the emperors, the patron saint of Japan._], not human, and not even similar to humans like the Faata… Sent a message to Father, begging for forgiveness. He almost went broke, but managed to buy out my contract. He begged on his knees to restore me at the school and not write a word about this shameful story into my file."

"Well, why shameful," Corcoran said. "Hundreds of thousands go to serve the Lo'ona Aeo, millions are moving to their worlds. The Chinese, Hindus, Arabs, the denizens of the Dark Africa, Brasil, Indonesia…"

Oki grimaced.

"Out of necessity, sir, out of necessity, but I went voluntarily, like a complete fool, defying the customs of my ancestors. What is necessity for others is shame for me!"

In a way, that was fair. The Lo'ona Aeo were the second highly-developed race after the Faata encountered by humanity in deep space, an ancient race, lacking any expansionist ambitions but possessing of great riches. They felt the need for allies and defenders, and Earth, with its excess of population, multiple war-like tribes, fit that role perfectly. A recruitment center was opened on Pluto, where the gravity of 0.25_g_ did not cause discomfort to the aliens. They paid handsomely for service, whatever the mercenaries wanted: valuables familiar to humans, or pleasant worlds, where anyone could get a new homeland after completing their term of service. There was a definite use for that for the poor overpopulated nations, like China or India, but the Japanese were not among them. _A proud people,_ Corcoran thought, habitually analyzing Oki's mental pulses, _proud, independent, with a high sense of honor._

"There is nothing in my file about my service for the Lo'ona Aeo, sir," the second navigator said. "But I wanted you know about it."

"Let's assume that you've eased your conscience," Corcoran replied and touched his shoulder. "Go rest, Yamaguchi. We're jumping to Gondwana in five hours… You can get some sleep."

The navigator saluted and left. Without putting on the contact helmet, Corcoran tapped some keys on the panel, pulled up the necessary section from ANS memory, and ordered it to visualize the picture. The forward viewscreen seemed to expand in width and depth; the holographic image was so bright, voluminous, the translucent veil obscuring the walls and the ceiling of the bridge, the round gray eye of the radar, the pilot's console with rows of equipment, lit up by yellow and green lights. Corcoran sighed in admiration. The shining garden of the Galactic Ecumene opened up before him; a hundred billion stars, Cepheids and clouds of rarefied gas, nebulae and hot stars, blue, white, yellowish: Spica, Sirius, Procyon, yellow and orange: Sol and Tau Ceti, red and white dwarves, red and yellow giants: Capella, Arcturus, Aldebaran, monstrous supergiants: Rigel, Betelgeuse, whose luminosity was a hundred thousand times greater than that of the Sun. Stellar associations, the Magellanic Clouds, Hyades, Pleiades, ancient globular clusters, hovering above and below the Milky Way, and the galactic spiral itself: the Sagittarius Arm, nearest to the galactic core, the Orion Arm with the glittering spark of Sol, and, beyond the Void, a dark gloomy abyss four thousand parsecs wide, the outer Perseus Arm. It was from there, that unimaginable distance, that the Faata had come, and somewhere over there, as yet unreachable to the ships of Earth, was their homeworld, possibly the center of an expansive empire. But its border, three planets in two star systems, was much closer, on the edge of the Orion Arm: twenty-three parsecs to Baal, forty to Gondwana, and sixteen more to the New Worlds, as the Bino Faata called these colonies. Less than eighty parsecs, an insignificant distance, compared to the abyss between the Arms… Undoubtedly, Earth had more rights to this region. As the Lo'ona Aeo had explained, each starfaring race strove to expand its sector of influence to natural borders: a protostellar nebula, a hydrogen cloud, or a void in the galactic space, lacking stars, planets, and other objects that could become support bases for the expansion of its neighbors. These border areas usually stretched for three to five hundred parsecs, which was a quite acceptable guarantee against a sudden attack of an alien fleet or a cybernetic strike. From that viewpoint, the New Worlds were located in the area of Earth's strategic interests, but that was only the external reason for annexing them. The internal reason, not connected to galactic politics in any way, only having to do with the Faata and humankind, was much more significant: the destruction of Timokhin's flotilla, the ruins of Earth's cities, and forty-three million dead.

Corcoran's fingers once again touched the keys, and the globular clusters, the Magellanic Clouds, and, with them, the glowing center of the galaxy started to float away up and to the sides. It was as if he was flying in an invisible ship, not in the quantum foam of Limbo, but in real space, in a fraction of a second, passing dimly glowing nebulae, singularity points with the abysses of black holes and clusters of stars, moving aside before him and disappearing beyond the edge of the screen. This galactic chart, given to the humans by the envoys of the Lo'ona Aeo, was very ancient, put together during the time of the Daskins [_The Daskins were one of the oldest races in the galaxy, scattering various artifacts throughout space, which were being actively studied by several modern starfaring races. The Daskins had disappeared over a million years ago. There is a hypothesis that the Great Red Spot on Jupiter is one of such artifacts._] and was, therefore, millions of years old. But it had both of the stars with the New Worlds, sticking out at the edge of the Void, like a pair of nails with orange and white heads, driven into the black marble of the everlasting darkness. Along with Alpha Malleus, they constituted a tiny star cluster, where the distances between the luminaries were about even, no more than half a parsec. That object was indistinguishable from Earth; Malleus was one of the constellations visible on Gondwana.

Aezat orbited Beta Malleus, a white dwarf, while Ro'on and T'har, the other two worlds settled by the Bino Faata, circled the orange Gamma. Naturally, they were absent from the Daskin chart, which contained only large objects, stars, black holes, nebulae; even such a wise ancient race would be incapable of counting up the myriad planets, comets, and asteroids. But humans, not all of them, of course, only those who needed to know, had become aware of the New Worlds prior to the contact with the Lo'ona Aeo and the examination of the galactic chart. Yo had mentioned these three planets at the very edge of the Void, and, while she had been unable to say much about them, the important facts were the very presence of these worlds, their proximity to Earth, their breathable air, their ecology, gravity, and energy balance, all quite suitable for humans.

The only thing Yo had known about Aezat was that it existed and that it was inhabited, but populated with a much lower density than the two Gamma Malleus planets. Actually, she had not known more about Ro'on, as she had been born on T'har and, after a period of incubation, had spent several years there. T'har was definitely not a world that appeared to Corcoran in the Dreams, for it lacked the enormous generous sun, violet skies, plains full of grass and trees. For the most part, T'har was covered in rocks, stones, and moss, but the equatorial belt with a cool but not very harsh climate had been settled by the Ein Sheaf, several thousand fully sentient Faata and three and a half million t'ho workers. Corcoran believed that his visions were more likely about Ro'on, a warmer and more fertile planet, which was located closer to the central star than T'har. Perhaps his biological father had been born on Ro'on or, having come on a starship, had lived there for a long time, far longer than Yo had been allotted. How long? A century or two? Maybe even three? That was possible; his Faata ancestor belonged to the higher caste, which was confirmed by the psychic abilities he had inherited from him.

Sighing, Corcoran removed the image of the galaxy and, like an imperceptible shadow, touched the minds of the crew. They were sleeping, some calmly, some tossing about in anxious oblivion; Selina Praagh appeared to be smiling, Oki was being tormented by a sense of guilt, the gunner Light Water, a Navajo, was seeing something pleasant. Their dreams were inaccessible to Corcoran, he could only catch a glint of the emotions generated by them, something like a mental echo that reverberated in the minds of the sleepers, gradually fading. The thoughts or images he could understand needed to be explicit, and, besides, he "heard" people differently; some were clearer, almost on the level of acoustic and visual perception, while other people's thoughts seemed blurred and vague, like a landscape covered by a thinning fog. Siebel's opinion was that it was determined by the mental potential of a particular brain, and the variations were fairly significant: besides the mass of people with average-level intelligence, both geniuses and morons continued to be born on Earth.

His crew was sleeping. Everyone slept, except for Klaus, who was either pretending to be asleep, was half-dozing, or was hiding in a shell impervious to telepathic communication. This had long ceased to surprise Corcoran, as Klaus Siebel, his closest friend, almost a brother, was a mysterious and strange persona. Undoubtedly, he thought with a rare logic and clarity, and his brain seemed to be open, but, at the same time, inaccessible to deeper penetration. Did that occur because of his activities as a USF Secret Service officer, was it a result of lengthy training or a unique property of his mind, capable of fencing itself off from another person's mental pulse?.. Either way, Corcoran never tried to punch through his barriers and touch the essence hidden behind them. Not out of fear to find something horrible, unexpected, unpleasant; it was simply that he, a keeper of his own mysteries, respected his friend's secrets. And Siebel was a true friend.

The crew woke up an hour before the end of the watch, and the bridge was soon filled with people. Corcoran moved to the captain's seat, Praagh, Tumanov, and Bai Ling, the on-duty pilot, took their places, Klaus settled in the cocoon by the hatch. Everything was going according to the routine, familiar and habitual for a warship: section reports, the dancing of glyphs above the pilot console, Selina Praagh's quiet voice, counting down the time to the jump, the outlines of the cruisers on the sensor screen, the scarlet stripe coming to life, leisurely crawling towards the pentalion… Also, calm inscrutable faces and a silent choir of prayers. They, these prayers, reminded him that a human was not what he seemed, that an external appearance was only a mask hiding the fear, alarm, uncertainty, and the passionate desire to overcome them, as befitted humans, warriors, and travelers through the universe.

Then came the sharp sound of the siren, muscles were permeated by tremors, Baal's faraway sun disappeared, and a small but bright disk flared in the upper-left corner of the viewscreen. A moment in Limbo, and forty parsecs were astern… Faster than light, faster than the solar wind, faster than cosmic background radiation… Faster than everything that could radiate and move, transfer vibration, propagate through real space…

They were in Gondwana's system.

There were five planets here and three asteroid belts: the ruins of worlds that had died so long ago that the times of these disasters were beyond calculation. The asteroids orbited between the fourth and fifth planets, two gas giants more massive than Jupiter; it was likely their pull that had ripped the heavenly bodies that were unfortunate enough to pass between them. Each of these protostars had a set of natural satellites of various shapes and sizes: over a hundred at the fifth world and eighteen at the fourth. The third planet, small, dry, and infertile, was reminiscent of Mars, the first, closest to the star, was being burned and melted by the solar storms, while the second, Gondwana, was habitable and was following the same evolutionary path as Earth. Currently, it was in the middle of the pleasant Miocene [_Miocene started on Earth around 25 million years ago. During this epoch, there were plants and animals very similar to modern ones; there were even apes._]: the atmosphere was 24% oxygen, the day was 24 hours, a tropical climate, broadleaf forest, and a myriad of animals that could be, with a stretch, called mammals. Gonwana's land had already split into two enormous landmasses, but they were not being settled, for the issue of the protection of the local fauna and flora or global terraforming [_Terraforming is the transformation of a planet to match terrestrial standards; first of all, the destruction or suppression of local species, a complete or partial biological sanitation, and then the propagation of terrestrial microbiota, plants, and animals._] was still up in the air. Human colonists and the USF base were located on an archipelago near the eastern landmass, and there was more than enough space there: three islands the size of Sicily and one as big as Madagascar surrounded the inner Turquoise Sea. Above that surface point was the orbital dock, there were also three large satellites and a pair of cruisers, joined into a defense system. Besides this military function, Gondwana had large tourist prospects: in time, it could turn into a resort or a game reserve.

Three members of Corcoran's crew had already been there, and when Red Alert was canceled, gathered in the wardroom, informing the newbies about the coming pleasures, swimming in the sea, dancing and flirting with the local nymphs, horseback riding, and the amazing wine made from blackcurrant mutated to the size of a pear. Corcoran didn't bother them, leaving Praagh and Bai Ling at the console; communication, a cup of coffee, laughter, and light chatter relieved the recent tension. The squadron, appearing out of nothingness beyond the fifth planet's orbit, was moving towards Gondwana, where they would spend a week or more, drop off the cargo meant for the base and transfer a hundred Peregrines to the satellites. Gondwana was the endpoint on the way to the alien and hostile worlds, and Vrba, as instructed, was supposed to reinforce the line of defense with people and equipment. No one knew if Special Task Force 37 would return or be destroyed, and what the Faata would do in the latter case; would they attack Earth again or strike at its colonies? But the determination of these circumstances was a matter for the future, and now, peace, serenity, and anticipation of a brief rest on the warm, hospitable Gondwana reigned aboard the ships.

Sending Selina to relax in the wardroom, Corcoran relaxed his cocoon's embrace, stretched out in the chair, and closed his eyes. The Captain's watch would end in seventeen minutes, there had been no orders from above, and he could relax a little. The gravity drives were quietly singing, Bai Ling was humming something in Chinese with a playful voice, the sounds of conversations, clinking cups, and the aroma of fresh-brewed coffee were coming from the wardroom. Corcoran knew that they wouldn't forget the pilot or him, they would bring some, and it would be either Selina or Klaus Siebel. But not now. Right now, they were busy with one another: Praagh was telling something funny to Siebel, and Corcoran felt the line connecting them becoming more noticeable and stronger.

He was happy for Klaus. That one didn't appear to show any interest in women, or that part of his life was safely hidden from prying eyes, but one thing Corcoran was sure of – Klaus Siebel was lonely. Time passed, though, and a person's opinions changed, even if his heart was made of steel, and his soul was as dry as Martian sands. When a person was pushing sixty, he realized that any change and any gift of fate was now the last one; if he didn't use it, he would eke out the old age alone, not living, merely existing without kindness and warmth.

_Maybe they would work out together?.._ Corcoran thought without opening his eyes. Klaus was, of course, twenty-five years her senior and not at all a handsome man, but these trifles wouldn't stop a woman, especially one like Selina. That was obvious to anyone who glanced at her file. A stubborn person! An impoverished childhood in Singapore, seven attempts to get to the local USF base, an unbeatable attraction to the stars, and…

"Message from the flagship, Captain," Communications Officer Dupressis's voice came. "It sounds like the Commodore wants to speak with you. Should I switch to the bridge?"

"Go ahead, Camille."

Bai Ling immediately stopped his vocal exercises, sat up straight and pulled himself up, the noise in the wardroom died down. A window opened in the viewscreen, right under the Malleus constellation, and Karel Vrba's cold eyes stared at Corcoran.

"Sir," he said, half-rising and saluting.

"Captain," Vrba nodded slightly in greeting. Then he wondered, "Dreaming of swimming in the Turquoise Sea? You'll have to postpone that this time. There is an assignment. A small one."

The wardroom became very quiet. _They're disappointed,_ Corcoran thought. He had been down to Gondwana twice already, and Eden wasn't pulling him a third time; he was used to vacationing with Vera and the girls. It would be better to do something useful now… On the other hand, after serving seven years aboard the _Europe_ under Vrba, he knew that his "small assignments" were pretty labor intensive and, for the most part, dangerous.

"Yes, sir."

"Commodore Dixon has a problem." Dixon was the head of the USF base on Gondwana, basically, the local chief of administration. "They've detected an alien ship. Recently."

Bai Ling started. Dead silence came from the wardroom.

"The Faata, sir?"

"No. Probably, not… A very strange vessel. It appears to be in power conservation mode. It's drifting in the second asteroid belt and not responding to attempts at contacting it." Pausing, the Commodore continued, "I've just had a talk with Dixon. He could have destroyed that ship… at least, he thinks he could have, but he decided to do the smart thing and wait for us. Our task force has competent experts. I am sending Asenov and Helga Swahn to you. Two experienced xenologists plus Siebel… I hope they can figure it out."

"The time of completion and instructions?" Corcoran asked.

"No more than two weeks. While we're near Gondwana." Vrba turned his head, listening to one of his officers, and a bright dot separated from the _Europe_ on the sensor screen. "The experts have already departed, keep their shuttle, you'll find it useful. Go see what's going on there, but carefully. We don't want carnage. As for instructions… Well, you know about DPT."

"Can I use weapons?"

"Only in the most extreme case, taking the experts' opinions into account. Besides the experts, I want you to listen yourself. You can, after all, listen well… Isn't that right, Paul?"

Corcoran nodded silently. Karle Vrba was one of the few people who knew the secret of his origins and the gift he'd inherited from the Faata. It was possible that only two people in the whole squadron were in on the secret: the Commodore and Klaus Siebel.

"The coordinates have been transmitted to your ANS. Be careful. Good luck," Vrba said and disappeared from the screen. The senior officers, Selina Praagh and Tumanov, headed for the bridge, followed by Siebel, while the wardroom was once again full of noise. But Corcoran was no longer feeling the recent disappointment, which was easily explained; Gondwana, with all its delights, was not going anywhere, but it wasn't every day that one encountered an alien ship.

"A ship!" Selina's thin eyebrows went up. "In power conservation mode! What could this mean?"

"I think we'll find a ship whose crew has died or an automated probe whose power resources are depleted," Tumanov suggested.

"The probability of such a random encounter is extremely small," Cyberneticist Linder informed them, slipping onto the bridge. "It's most likely an already-activated detection device. It's playing possum, but is really monitoring the system where we appeared."

"What do we know about probabilities!" Siebel said. "The Daskin chart shows dozens of races, and, if each of them has a fleet with thousands of ships and unmanned probes, then–"

"Captain!" Kirill Pelevich's massive figure appeared in the hatch. "What should my section do? Warm up the annihilator?" He stepped over the threshold, and the bridge immediately became cramped.

"All right," Corcoran said, getting up. "I would ask all those who don't belong here to leave. Your watch, Nikolay. Plot the course, report the ETA to me. We'll follow instructions, taking opinions of the experts into account. Do you still remember the DPT protocol?"

This document, determining the order of the contact with aliens and unidentified ships, had a number and an official name, but all the fleets knew it under the acronym DPT. Don't Punch in the Teeth… at the very least, not right away. A contact was a delicate procedure, requiring mutual patience, tolerance, and at least a grain of trust. Trust was as rare a commodity in the galaxy as the benevolent wisdom of humanity's brethren. A fairy tale, nothing more! Especially if one was talking about the Haptors or the Dromi, whom the soldiers hired by the Lo'ona Aeo had already encountered. Which was why the main point of the DPT protocol was to determine the moment when one should open fire or flee.

The deck shuddered slightly under their feet.

"The shuttle with the experts has docked," Bai Ling reported.

"I'll go meet them." Corcoran headed for the hatch, glancing at the ship's chronometer. "You have the conn!"

"Aye-aye, sir," Tumanov shouted back, lowering himself into the seat by the ANS panel. "A few minutes, Captain. I'll plot the course now."

"I've never seen anything like this. Never and nothing," xenologist Ivan Asenov, a specialist in alien technology, muttered. "Doesn't look like Faata battle modules, and nothing similar to Lo'ona Aeo, Dromi, or Haptor ships."

"Just a pile of gray mud," Helga Swahn noted.

Both of the xenologists had fairly recently been Corcoran's colleagues, and he remembered well that Helga's specialty was Transinformatics. The deciphering of an alien language's signals and symbols.

"Never seen… A pile of gray mud…" Corcoran repeated slowly. "Well, experts, what other smart things will you tell us? Anything pleasant?"

There were five of them with Klaus Siebel and the pilot Seriy. Wearing vacuum suits, they were in the shuttle, under the transparent carapace of the cabin, cluttered by Swahn's equipment, decipherers, optical and acoustic sensors, and various signaling devices. A kilometer away from them, pointing her weapons at the alien, hung the _Commodore Litvin_, and dead ahead was that same pile of dust or mud that, most likely, was an alien ship or was hiding it under the gray skin with a multitude of outgrowths and wrinkles. If that was disguise, it was completely ridiculous; the object was noticeably different from the asteroids, stone and metallic rocks, its sharp edges gleaming in the light of the distant sun.

"Yegor," Corcoran said to the pilot, "let's fly around and record everything in detail. Just drop the floodlights… I think four will be enough."

Four pods flew out of the clip above the cabin, dispersed to the sides, and lit up, flooding the strange structure with bright beams. The boat started to slowly circle it, keeping several hundred meters away. Holocameras quietly chirred.

"Drive," Asenov spoke with obvious confusion. "Lord of Emptiness, where is the drive on this damn thing? It has to move somehow…"

"It's not reacting to signals," Helga Swahn said, hunching over her devices. "Silence on all frequencies, except the IR band [_IR stands for infrared, or thermal, radiation._].

"Profile?"

"Normal distribution [_Normal, or Gaussian, distribution is a bell-shaped curve. For example, this is the distribution of the speeds and kinetic energies of the air molecules, with the maximum of the curve (i.e. the most likely speed and energy) corresponding to the temperature._]. The temperature is about 120 Kelvin. Paul, maybe we should get closer, look for an airlock? I'll scan the surface with the intrascope, and then…"

"No need," Siebel suddenly spoke, having been quiet until this moment. "No need for an intrascope, my dear colleague. The ship in front of us is Silmarri, and that bulge that's facing away from the star is a docking port. If we raise the temperature a little, we'll be able to get inside."

"Open Sesame…" Asenov wanted to scratch his head, but his hand hit his helmet. "How do you know this, Klaus?"

"From Commodore Litvin's report and the transcripts of conversations with Yo. Why didn't you familiarize yourself with them, Ivan? You have top clearance!"

"Of course I looked at them." Aksenov looked a little dumbfounded. "I looked, but I don't remember…"

"You should have read it, thoroughly, not merely looked. The Faata are quarreling with the Silmarri and have gathered plenty of information on them," Siebel noted dryly. "With your permission, Paul… If we approach that bulge that looks like a Japanese hat and illuminate it with a floodlight or, better yet, two, then the airlock will open, and we'll be able to enter the ship. I think it's completely safe."

Corcoran hesitated for a second, then nodded to the pilot.

"Do it, Yegor. Put all the floodlights there."

The boat moved to the conical protrusion. Two glowing balls floated behind it, two in front, lighting up the gray uneven surface, as if cobbled together from lumps of clay.

"What about the defense systems of these Silmarri?" Helga Swahn asked with a nervous smile. "Do they have some sort of automated defenses? Sentry computers, robots, or something else?"

"The ship has powerful weapons, but, if I'm not mistaken, it lacks any methods of defense familiar to us."

"Why?"

"Because, my dear, the Silmarri are not human, they think differently and don't require computers or robots. The ship's defense is its crew… well, to be more precise, its inhabitants' collective mind."

A pair of light pods moved to the top of the airlock. This part of the ship was in the shade; its massive hull, half a kilometer across, blocked the sunlight, and that made the stars seem especially bright.

Corcoran leaned over the panel, clicking the intercom key.

"Praagh? This is the Captain. We're attempting to get inside their ship."

"Understood, sir. We're at combat readiness."

The cone's shape suddenly changed, it started to stretch up and bend, becoming similar to a bird-of-prey's beak. Waves rolled through the ship's hull, the cone, as if absorbing them, was growing before their eyes, becoming wider and longer, the nits surface on both sides from the top came apart, as if a jaw suspended on hinges, and the beams of the floodlights illuminated the spacious chamber. The shuttle could have fit in the airlock, but Corcoran, catching the pilot's questioning look, shook his head.

"No. Stay here, Yegor. If anything happens, you will cover us."

The transparent cover above the cabin slid open. Now the only things separating them from the emptiness were their helmets and the thin, durable fabric of their work suits. Unlike combat suits, they were not as bulky, lacked an exoskeleton, and did not require special skills. Probably only Corcoran would have been able to move normally in a combat suit, maybe Siebel as well. But he rarely let others know about his skills.

Strapping a holocamera to his shoulder, Corcoran pushed away and flew into the open maw of the airlock. His movements were confident, graceful, and precise, like that of any astronaut used to weightlessness, where one didn't walk or run but jumped and flew. One of the floodlights hovering astern of the boat, dimmed its bright glow and followed him, obeying his command.

Siebel jumped, then Asenov. Helga Swahn, gripping the back of the pilot seat, looked as they disappeared in the airlock of an alien ship. Fear paralyzed her; Corcoran felt it as clearly as Siebel's unshakable calm and Asenov's curiosity. He remembered Uncle Pavel's tales, the sparse information about the Silmarri given to Litvin by the quasi-living mechanism or, perhaps, the creature that controlled the starship that had arrived from the New Worlds. According to this information, the Silmarri were a strange race: giant worms, possessing neither individuality, nor eyes, limbs, lungs, or a stomach. But, despite that, they traveled through space and were far from harmless, which could be evidenced by few, including Faata pilots; those who survived an encounter with them.

"Helga, if you don't want to, you don't have to come with us," Corcoran said softly. "Stay in the boat with Yegor."

"I'll go."

As if diving into a swamp, she quickly slipped through the space separating them. Now all four of them were standing in the airlock, a wide cylindrical compartment, stretching forty-fifty paces into the ship. Six wide gutters twisted in a spiral along its walls, coming together in the far end at the circular valve that looked like tightly clenched meaty lips.

"The locking sphincter," Siebel said. "I think we need to shine a light on it."

The ball of light moved towards the valve, flaring up.

"No need to raise the temperature too much. Like that, it's enough… There are very sensitive mechanisms here."

"Gutters," Asenov spoke, looking around. "If they move in these gutters, then their body mass is higher than a human's. I would say, significantly, an order of magnitude higher."

"It's possible." Siebel watched the meaty mouth, as it was slowly opening, stretching into a ring. "Commodore Litvin, who saw the recordings on the Faata ship, estimated their size at six meters in length and a meter and a half in diameter. But their bodies can stretch, reaching–"

"Huge snakes!" Helga Swahn interrupted him, shuddering. "They'll swallow any of us like a rabbit!"

"Nonsense," Siebel grunted. "How can they swallow, if they don't have a throat or an esophagus? They feed through their skin."

Corcoran did not participate in this discussion, instead, focusing his internal hearing, tried to catch at least an echo of a mental wave. Alas! No visual or auditory information, not even a sense of warmth that was always brought by touching another being's mind… He could have sworn that the ship was empty or was drifting among these asteroids with a dead crew.

Through the circular valve, they entered into the next compartment. It turned out to be enormous, probably taking up virtually the entire volume of the ship, stretching for hundreds of meters up, down, and to the sides. Thin, transparent, crystal-clear plates of various shapes, glowing in the floodlight's beam, were connected into a chaotic, incredible for human logic structure; they intersected and joined one another at acute or obtuse angles, forming a three-dimensional maze out of hundreds or, possibly, thousands of chambers. These cells did not have a floor, walls, or a ceiling, only framing surfaces, dotted by a multitude of holes: round, even, about a meter in diameter. Here and there, flexible hoses or cables of some darker matter stretched from the outer hull along the joins of the plates, opening into wide, deep bowls at the end, looking like enormous tulips or lilies with round petals and several tendrils. Through this volume-filling structure, seemingly endless, fragile, and ghostly, like an astral vision, a central core, massive, long, seemingly cast from black faceted glass that absorbed light, shone through. It likely pierced the ship from the bow to the stern, if such concepts even applied here.

"You wanted to look at the drive?" Siebel touched Asenov's elbow. "I believe this is it. That black pipe."

The xenologist nodded.

"I agree. A pipe means a contour drive, which means that they move through Limbo. But how do they calculate the direction and the length of the jump? I don't see–"

"Screens, molecular circuits, detectors, sensors, and so forth?" Siebel interrupted him with a grin. "There's no set table either, or fanfare in honor of our arrival. They're not human, Ivan, don't forget that! Not human, but creatures of some other nature."

"You're telling this to me? A xenologist?" Chuckling in turn, Asenov tilted his head and stared at the crystal plates. "Stretching their bodies, they can, obviously, move through these openings… but, naturally, in weightlessness… and the hemispherical structures at the dark cables or veins look like control organs… What do you think, Captain?"

"I don't. I'm merely recording the situation and the conclusions of the specialists."

Corcoran touched the camera on his shoulder. But, unwillingly, a clear picture formed in his consciousness: enormous worms quickly and smoothly glided in the crystal maze, either squeezing into a white clump or stretching to ten-fifteen meters, bent over the tulip bowls, stuck their eyeless heads, or maybe tails, in them, and froze, becoming a single sentient being, capable of action. He was almost certain that this wasn't a figment of his imagination, but an echo of reality; his certainty was supported by the fact that the vision was similar to a Dream, except that it was happening while he was awake. Then again, there was no and couldn't have been any basis for it in his genetic memory; it was difficult to believe that one of his ancestors could have watched live Silmarri, especially on their ship. It was more likely that his hereditary gift was not limited to Dreams and telepathic perception, being capable of something more…

The analyzer in Helga Swahn's hands started clicking.

"There is an atmosphere here, but it's thin," she said. "Nitrogen, carbon monoxide, methane, inert gases, and organics… strange organics, the device can't determine it… Their food?"

She looked at Siebel, but he only shrugged.

"Possibly. I don't know. We don't have a lot of information, only from the sources I mentioned. We don't know much about the Silmarri at all. For example, the Lo'ona Aeo, our dear friends, know nothing about them and don't wish to find anything out. They just let them pass through their sector and never feud with the worms."

"So, we got lucky," Asenov said. "We have a lot of material for study: a whole ship, likely abandoned."

Klaus Siebel chuckled, glancing at Corcoran, but he shook his head slightly, indicating that he couldn't sense or feel anything.

"A mistaken conclusion, Ivan. Silmarri don't abandon their ships, for they have no other worlds, no other refuge. They are galactic wanderers… Each ship has a family unit, and if we look for it properly, we'll find it."

"I don't really want to look for them," Helga Swahn forced out, turning pale. "I think I'll bring my equipment from the boat and start on my analyses."

"That's reasonable. As for us, I think we will look for them, after all."

Siebel pushed away with the toe of his boot and slipped into an opening in an obliquely-hanging panel. Corcoran and Asenov floated behind him, holding the rims of the holes, or jumping off the transparent plates, which turned out to be not hard at all but flexible and springy, like the surface of a trampoline. They kept rising and falling, passing chamber after chamber, tracing the direction of the dark cables, peering into the hemispherical alcoves covered in suckers: maybe they were contact devices. Siebel appeared to know where to lead them, and, following him, Corcoran suddenly started to realize that these chambers and sections of various shapes and sizes, small as the wardroom aboard the _Litvin_ or as large as a hold, were not really local habitats, rooms, or quarters, where someone worked or lived, like it was on human ships. The ship itself was such a space, and these transparent elastic surfaces had the same purpose as threads of a spider web, providing support for the bodies of the beings living in it, and communication lines, connecting them with one another and, probably, with the ship's surface, drive, airlocks, and other machinery. The insight came to him suddenly, as did the thought that this whole vessel, and the web filling it, and the shaft of the hyperlight drive, and the flower-like bowls, were more like biological objects, not metallic, ceramic, or plastic devices.

How did he know this? Not an idle question, but it remained unanswered. Knowledge could not explain itself.

They had moved about two hundred meters from the airlock, when Siebel stopped and raised his hand, calling for attention. The flexible plate under their feet connected to five or six others; they were slanted, forming something similar to a pyramid three times the height of a human; the neighboring chambers had the same size and featured open lily bowls at the ends of dark cables, and the faceted surface of the acceleration shaft was above them; in Corcoran's opinion, it was the most interesting object in the vicinity. But Siebel was looking down, where there was an extensive cavity, whose bottom was covered by a white fog. Looking closer, Corcoran noticed that this cloudy mass seemed to be made up of separate fragments, either stretched out or curled into rings, as if the veil was grainy, consisting of separate, fairly large particles. All three of them were floating in zero-g above this formation, like passengers of an airplane soaring above the clouds.

Asenov's exhale was audible in the helmet radio.

"So that's what they're like... a whole flock or a herd... at least several hundred..."

"Not a flock and not a herd, it's a family unit," Klaus Siebel countered. "This is a sentient being, my friends. Intelligent enough to move to space at the time when the Cro-Magnons were tracking mammoths at the foot of the Würm glaciers [_Würm glaciation took place 30,000-40,000 years ago._]. Creatures who rejected the planetary surface and created their world as they wished." Siebel turned around and waved smoothly. "Not seeking contact with other races, not aggressive, not warlike, if one doesn't bother them. But if someone does infringe on them, destroy their ships, or block their movement... Let's just say it's best not to do that."

"Rejected the planetary surface..." Asenov repeated thoughtfully. "Well, they're not original in that respect; the Lo'ona Aeo also, for the most part, live in space. Of course, Lo'ona Aeo settlements that this caterpillar rookery..." He stared down, then threw a worried glance at Corcoran. "Paul! Are you filming, Paul?"

"Every detail," Corcoran reassured him, looking at the owners of the ship, huddled in a huge pile. "I'd like to know what's with them. Completely motionless, inert, no connection with the outside world, no feelings, no thoughts, no reaction to our invasion... Are they asleep? Hibernating? Or dead?"

"They are busy doing an important and urgent task: expecting progeny," Siebel explained. "They're very vulnerable at such times. But, as I said, it's best not to bother them. When the reproductive stage will end, they will disappear, leave quietly, not disturbing anyone. You can report that to Vrba and Dixon."

"Is that all?"

"No, not all... Now we know a little more about them: your recordings, Helga's analyses, and our observations. Humans are newcomers to the galaxy, one could say cheechako, and our main problem is to figure out who poses a threat and who doesn't. Whatever the Silmarri meaning of life is, they aren't interested in humans. I am fully confident in this."

"They are at fighting the Faata," Corcoran noted.

"They are. And who do you think started it?" The edge of Siebel's mouth rose. It was not a smile but a hint of one. "All right, friends, let's get out of here. It's not nice to peek into other people's bedrooms."

They floated to Helga Swahn and the floodlight by the airlock through the endless series of openings.

The _Commodore Litvin_ was awaiting the squadron beyond the fifth planet's orbit. It was a waste of time to head for Gondwana; the cruisers, free from their cargo, were moving towards the system's periphery, to make the final jump of this expedition. Any place could be used to submerge into Limbo, but the start point was always chosen far from a star: strong gravity fields blurred the arrival point. The art of navigation involved getting to the edge of a star system and ensuring that the group of ships, jumping simultaneously, did not end up scattered over several light months. The contour drive made flights over very long distances possible, but targeting required precise calculations, taking all confounding factors into account. The problem was simplified by moving the jump point farther from central star and the planets, somewhere in the Oort cloud.

And so, the _Litvin_ waited, hanging in the cold dark emptiness, the crew was holding watches, the specialists—Siebel, Asenov, and Helga Swahn—were examining the recordings made on the Silmarri ship, and the Captain was indulging in reflections. Something was happening to him, some walls in his consciousness were collapsing, barriers were falling, doors were opening; an unseen mental stream was washing away the remained of the obstacles and pulling him along, farther and father, faster and faster, but where?.. He did not know that, but he also did not fear the ongoing changes. It had happened to him before, when he was little, when he started to catch thought fragments, perceive feelings, empathize, get into metapsychic resonance with other people's minds against his will. He had gotten scared then, and, if not for Klaus Siebel, he would have spent many long months in terror, maybe even years... That had been then, during childhood! But he was a grown man now, and the changes no longer caused fright or horror but curiosity.

What was their cause? Perhaps, he had reached an appropriate age, at which a new mutation became unavoidable; perhaps, this flight to the New Worlds was something like a trigger: the flight itself or the unusual, strange things he had seen on the Silmarri ship. His ability to perceive mental images didn't appear to get stronger, and the Dreams continued to visit him with the same regularity, but a new gift had begun to show itself: objects, things, the environment had suddenly started talking to him. Their voices were quiet, the visions either vague or clear but brief like the flash of lightning at night. The first time, he had seen the crystal maze and the flexible Silmarri bodies, sliding in the gloomy space, then there had been other mirages, showing either Mom, or Yo, or Uncle Pavel, but they had not appeared as they did on portraits and photographs, but in scenes and situations that were not and could not be in Corcoran's memories. For example, a dark cramped chamber: Mom was leaning against a wall, Yo was bent over her, and Uncle Pavel, as if defending them both, was standing clad in a combat suit. All of them were young, as if clocks had been turned back, making them captives aboard the Faata starship once again...

The squadron passed the third asteroid belt and was due to arrive in a day. Selina Praagh had the morning watch; inviolable calm stood on the ship and in the surrounding space. Corcoran, having been relieved from watch, was sitting in Siebel's quarters, his eyes half-closed and his legs outstretched. It was as tiny as his own captain's quarters, but, instead of auxiliary controls, there was a long, narrow desk with a pair of holographic projectors, a pile of books, a pocketpute, and a film screen stretched above it. The desk was decorated by some kind of trinket that looked like a tiny octopus made of multicolored plastic or glass. It seemed this souvenir was dear to Klaus, as it was protected by a translucent cap, which was dulling the colors and blurring the outlines.

"Is that all?" Siebel asked.

Corcoran nodded. His eyes kept coming back to the trinket under the cap, bearing a momentary image: something wrapped in fabric in a four-fingered hand. A Lo'ona Aeo's hand, he noted automatically.

"You said some interesting things..." A deep wrinkle formed on the bridge of Siebel's nose. "In centuries past, it was called clairvoyance. Touching an object revealed the fate of its owner; for example, picking up a shoe taken from a corpse, a clairvoyant could unmask the killer. It was crap, of course, nonsense! But entertaining."

"I have no one to unmask," Corcoran said. "We're a little low on corpses at the moment, and this new ability of mine doesn't obey me."

"You mean you can't control it?"

"Yeah. There are flashes of some strange scenes, but only of their own will..." He reached for the object under the cap. "Looks like a cuttlefish or an octopus. Can I see?"

"No." Klaus moved the cap farther, behind a holoprojector. "Not a thing to be looked at. I'll tell you its secret someday, but for now, please repeat what you saw on the Silmarri ship. For the record, in detail."

Corcoran repeated. Then his eyes searched for the "octopus", and, when they confirmed that it was not visible behind the projector, he frowned and muttered, "Everything is mysterious about you, Klaus, even a piece of glass on the desk is a secret. I'm not even talking about yourself."

Siebel's thin lips quivered in a smile.

"Such is the service, Paul. Both of us, you and I, are mysterious personae. You are half-human, and I..." he smiled again, "I might not be human at all."

Corcoran was silent for a minute, thinking over this statement. A jest, a practical joke? But, despite Siebel's grin, this didn't feel like either a jest or a practical joke. Definitely not! On the contrary, he sensed a firm determination, as if his friend was tired of pretending. It seemed that the masks, hiding the face, soul, and mind of Klaus Siebel, were ready to come down.

A thought kept beating in Corcoran's consciousness, as if he was beginning to see the essence hiding under all these masks clearly.

"The Silmarri," he spoke slowly, "Silmarri... you know too much about the Silmarri. How, Klaus? Yo definitely hadn't spoken about them. All the information is in Litvin's reports, and I remember it well, unlike Asenov. It talks about the collective mind, about their quarrel with the Faata, and the ship destroyed near Jupiter. There is also a description of its external appearance without dimensions... Nothing more."

"Really?" Siebel raised his eyebrows ironically. "Well, what's not there?"

"Not a word about how to get inside their ship, about the devices sensitive to heat, about the Silmarri feeding through their skin, about their reproduction and wandering through the galaxy," Corcoran listed. "Don't try to put one over me, Klaus, I'm not as simple-minded as Asenov! This is not and could not be in the reports, probably because no Faata has even seen a living Silmarri."

"No Faata has, but we, I mean the Secret Service, are far more curious. Are you taking that into account, Paul? Maybe this isn't the first time we have met the Silmarri, but not everyone know about that. Not every fleet officer, let's say."

"The xenologists would have to have known... and Vrba..." Corcoran stopped talking for a moment, then, smiling, touched his fingers to his temple. "Who are you trying to trick, Klaus? A telepath? You're closed, I can't perceive your thoughts, but your emotions are a different story, can't put a barrier around them... And, if we're being honest, I've never met anyone who could put up a mental block. No one ever, except for one Secret Service officer!"

Siebel laughed, but his eyes were serious, even sad.

"All right, let's assume you've unmasked me. Maybe not even today but long ago, and, if so, I value your sensitivity. But the world is moving forward, the wheels of fate are spinning, and, regardless of our wishes, they are pushing us to this or that... This conversation had to happen eventually, so why not now? The time is suitable, especially if we imagine what the Commodore needs."

"Vrba?"

"Yes. What he needs from you, why he put the module on your ship, and why you are on this expedition... Have you thought about it?"

"Actually, I'm a pretty quick-witted guy," Corcoran said.

"I have no doubt. Okay, look!"

Siebel rubbed his face with his hands, and his features suddenly started to blur, his forehead and cheeks turned dark, his nose grew wide, with thick nostrils, his lips bulged, and his dark as night hair twisted in tight coils. This was magic, devilry! The head of a giant black man stuck out of Siebel's puny shoulders: a large skull, chocolate skin, powerful brow, prominent cheekbones... This man was still young and surprisingly handsome, with that noble beauty given to its sons by Black Africa.

"Who?" Corcoran wheezed. "Who?"

"Umkhonto Tlume, diplomat, former representative of the Free Zulu Territory in the UN Security Council. That is what's written in Gunther Voss's file, secret document #112/56-AD... Would you like to see Voss? Or Roy Bunch, Liu Chang, Nikolay Krivin? There are other personae too... Shall I show them?"

Corcoran exhaled loudly.

"I think that's enough. I may not be entirely human, but this is a creepy sight for either of my halves. Can I ask... yeah, that's good. You're a good-looking black man, but I'm more used to Klaus."

"The part about you being half-human was a joke," Siebel said solemnly. "I'm sorry if this offended you. Both humans and Faata are people, and you are the best proof of that. And I... even I... sort-of, became a human. Almost."

They sat in the cramped quarters of a small ship, thrown to the edge of Gondwana's star system, looked at one another, and smiled. Then Corcoran asked, "Will you tell me, Klaus?"

"I will. This, Paul, is a long, very long story...


	5. Chapter 4

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (Ответный удар) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Chapter 4**

**Klaus Siebel. The Centuries of Loneliness**

The name he'd been given at birth could not be said with sounds, but, like most names on any inhabited world of the galaxy, it had a meaning. Not a very pleasant one for Klaus Siebel, but not insulting either; from the viewpoint of his race, the name spoke of the main characteristic, the difference from the other Metamorphs/Proteids, determining the fate and occupation of whomever held it. There were hundreds of ways to translate this name into the languages of Earth, if one used words for describing people with disabilities. Lame, blind, deaf, armless... All that would, technically, fit Siebel, except for the fact that his people lacked arms and legs, ears and eyes. They could grow them if they wished, but their original form was that of a resilient, flexible, and ductile substance without a defined shape. For that reason, it would be better to use a term not connected to the absence of any particular organ, instead reflecting the problem in its entirety: cripple, defective, invalid... But that would also not be the truth but an approximation of it: the ability of the Metamorphs to modify their bodies precluded such concepts, just like any diseases, old age, or untimely death.

Not a cripple, not an invalid, but an Exile – that was how Klaus Siebel's name best translated into human languages. The definition of his occupation and status was also unclear, stemming from the human selfishness in the highest degree, the desire to see themselves as the chosen race, the focus of power and mind of the universe. Pandering to this ridiculous idea, Siebel, AKA the Exile, was more and more often calling himself an emissary during the recent century, which flattered the ego of the humans with whom he came into direct contact. An emissary meant a messenger, an individual with diplomatic authority or an important mission, and, therefore, Earth had to have been noticed among the other primitive worlds, recognized its uniqueness or, at least, showed interest in humankind. Which meant that they weren't so primitive after all! No longer bloodthirsty savages out in the galactic boondocks, but something more, almost civilized beings!

If one took into account the role Siebel, AKA Gunther Voss, had played in the fight with the Faata, one could recognize him as not only an emissary but the guardian of Earth. Even its savior! Like all Metamorphs, he had the ability to teleport, although somewhat limited: he could freely travel within the limits of the planet and send a small object beyond the Martian orbit or to the Asteroid Belt. A priceless gift! And had he not used it to aid Litvin, held captive aboard the Faata ship? Had he not cancelled their plans, and their lives along with them, when they barely landed? Maybe not with his own hands, but the deadly act had been thought up by him, and the guiding idea was important than the muscles of the implementer! Of course, there had been no way to avoid casualties, and they had been immense, but such was the world: one couldn't get nothing from nothing, neither sand in the desert nor water on the river bank. The mind of the Earth aborigines was not great, but they had assimilated this truth.

Had he been able to, he would have destroyed the Faata himself, playing the role of the savior without assistants. But one couldn't do the impossible… Although he had lived on Earth for many years and acquired a lot of habits, dictated by human physiology, killing was inaccessible to him. A useful instinct, but one lost by his people in times immemorial… The Metamorphs' primitive ancestors, possessing only the beginnings of sentience and psychic power, had already dominated their planet and, over ten-twenty millennia, had exterminated all the species threatening them, all the competition on land, in the air, and at sea, taking over the ecological niches of the predators. Existence had become safe, but they had paid for it with the disappearance of many animals, gaps in the food chain, and the scarcity of the planetary biocenosis. And not only that: in the absence of external enemies, their killer instincts had atrophied.

Then again, there was a simple alternative to killing: instead of killing, manipulate those who kept this valuable ability. And that was why the Exile, AKA Klaus Siebel, having gone through a thousand names in eight centuries, was not an emissary or a messenger, and, most definitely, not a guardian or a savior. On the world of the Metamorphs, which he had left so long ago that the memory of his home started to fade, he was considered to be a Protector. But he protected not Earth but that world he'd left behind.

Metamorphs did not have sexes. New life originated with the melding of several individuals: one of them, accepting a newly-formed bud, then grew it in its flesh and, after a length of time between three to five revolutions of the planet around its sun, produced an offspring. The connection between the child and the parent was extremely strong and was established even before birth. While the offspring was maturing (which also took a long time), the connection had a mental and emotional components, but, gradually, the center of gravity kept shifting into the intellectual area. The child received a certain volume of information from its parent, allowing it to determine its place in the world of the adult Metamorphs and realize that its lifespan was so great, that every inclination, every natural gift would have time to grow and reach its upper limit. These talents added variety to their existence and were the cure for boredom, as the Exile's race knew no other worries: in their natural shape, the Metamorphs fed on any organic substance and did not experience the need for clothing, shelter, or all sorts of little things necessary to other, not as perfect creatures.

However, their imperfection hid a tempting charm. Other body shapes, other organs and sensations, other joys and fears, other customs and pleasures; all that was so seductive! Creating an interstellar drive in ancient times, the Metamorphs had met with hundreds of races and gained a chance to play at being someone else. Changing their appearance had become habitual, then a tradition; it was believed that self-reflection was best done in the body of a Spolder, while, for example, the shell of a Dromi or a Haptor was more suitable for manual labor. If the matter had to do with serious things, then the appearance of an Eich was selected, for it was a laconic but deeply sensitive creature.

The Sorrowful, the Exile's parent, looked like an Eich today. His former name was Sliding-with-the-Wind, but he took a new name on that unfortunate day when there was no doubt about his offspring's defectiveness. _Perhaps,_ the Exile thought, _the parent's sorrow will pass if he gives life to another being, a more successful one, without genetic abnormalities?_ But when would that happen? In many thousands of Revolutions, in the distant future? Perhaps never? The act of conception was rare.

He had gotten used to his parent's anguish, which seemed to him stronger than the realization of his own woes. A painful feeling, but what could he do? Parents always worried about their offsprings' misfortunes.

"I have contacted Cloudy Coolness," the Sorrowful spoke, ponderously moving his upper pair of tentacles. "Cloudy Coolness, Rainbow, Warm Waters, all those who have examined you… They insist that there is no hope."

"I am aware of that," the Exile said. Unlike his parent, he did not appear as an Eich, maintaining his natural shape, a stripe of matter shimmering in the sun on one of an arbor's seating columns. This structure looked like a woven basket made of flowering shrubs, dotted with spots of silver and pink soft moss. Metamorphs were an aesthetic people, with an irresistible craving for the beautiful, for elegant structures, for wide-open spaces and landscapes, to experience which it was worth taking the effort of growing eyes.

His parent stroked the Exile gently with a tentacle.

"Rainbow said that your omm cells, the ones that produce the hormones necessary for transformation, have atrophied. This means–."

"I know." The Exile coiled tighter around the column, feelings its smooth surface, heated by the sun, with his entire body. "This means that the transformation from the natural shape to any other will be my first and last. The omm cells will die out from the effort; not all but most of them. Those that remain will produce the hormones, but in too small amounts to allow for radical changes. The shape, the physiology, the genetic system, all that will stay unchanged… Only variations of the external appearance will be possible."

"A very rare genetic mutation," the Sorrowful noted sadly. "Rainbow insists that there are no more than a dozen like you. And all of them are in the Guard."

"Dark Waters informed me that such mutations had been noticed forty-eight times in twenty thousand Revolutions. Where are the other…" the Exile paused and said the unpleasant word, "the other outcasts?"

"Dark Waters was afraid to upset you. The others… the others, my poor child, were unable to take it. They did not join the Guard, wishing to stay on our world, among their own kind, but…" The Sorrowful's tentacles convulsed. "They were unsuccessful."

The Exile thought over this information. He did not want to die, at least now, when he had become a mature and sufficiently intelligent being. It was too bad he hadn't been destroyed when he was an unfeeling embryo… Perhaps that would have been an act of highest mercy.

"What happened to them?" he asked. "With those who were unsuccessful?"

"They died. Some tried to transform without enough hormones, but they were unable to create a viable organism. Others threw themselves out into space, into the emptiness… Dry Bark pointed his ship at the sun, Last Sunset entered a disintegration field… Another one, can't remember his name, programmed a sigga to destroy… Different means, same fate."

The Exile continued to reflect. The original shape of his race, the only one he knew, to which he had been attached his whole conscious life, did not allow much, for Metamorphs, not counting the brain, the digestive system, and the endocrine glands, did not possess specialized organs. Feeding and breathing, psychic exchange, teleportation, tactile sensation, locomotion, but not a very quick one, that was about it… Any biological systems and receptors: to perceive electromagnetic waves, for delicate and precise work, for flight or swift running, for acoustic detection, basically, everything they desired, was created and altered depending on the necessary goal. Using terrestrial analogy, the Exile was blind and deaf, lacking a tongue or limbs, unable to taste or smell or even crawl for a meter without the risk of hitting an obstacle. Of course, terrestrial analogies did not work completely, for the world of telepaths generously shared information with the Exile. He was now looking at a plain stretching to the mountains, at spots of moss and a shrub with lilac flowers, at the sky with the warm circle of the sun, looked through the eyes of his parent and talked with him soundlessly, not requiring either air vibrations or primitive speech organs.

But still, still… He wanted so much to see on his own! To see, hear, feel!

Naturally, there was a solution: perform the only transformation he would be able to do in his life, modeling it on a Lo'ona Aeo or a Haptor, a Kni'lina, an Eich or a Dromi. A sentient creature with a high degree of versatility, to avoid later regretting the lost capabilities and blaming himself for the rashness. To transform once and for all, to live in an unchanging shape and to become alien to his people in time, whose existence was not being oppressed by the permanence of the flesh. Ultimately, to steel himself and leave…

His thoughts were open to his parent.

"I do not wish to lose you and do not wish to push you towards the Guard," the Sorrowful said. "You could stay here, with me… you could, if you turn into a Spolder."

"Has anyone ever done this?"

"I don't know, but I can ask Stream-among-Stones. He knows several Spolders."

"If we must ask, then why not ask them directly? I would ask myself… I would, if they allow and wish to see me."

Long ago, the Exile's race had resettled the Spolders from their dying planet to their own world, giving them a fertile island near the equator. Spolders were few in number, and they were known to be reclusive, with a penchant for peace and quiet, refused to adopt technology, and did not seek contact with the Metamorphs. Of course, there had been exceptions.

"I will try to arrange something with one of them," the Sorrowful said. "With one of those who still maintains communication with us. Wait for me here, my child."

His shape started to change, the flexible tentacles disappeared, an Eich's dense, clumsy body became thinner and slimmer, the rough skin was covered by shiny scales, huge gray wings swung out. A moment later, he soared above the plain, ascended to the blue sky, and headed south along with the warm wind that was pushing the clouds. He could have gotten to the Spolder island faster, but he did not use teleportation, which meant that he wanted to think on the way.

The Exile, coiling around the column, was also thinking. Losing his link to his parent and submerging into the darkness, he thought about the Guard and his fellow sufferers, thrown into the faraway worlds somewhere in the galactic depths. Probably on planets of the most savage, bloodthirsty races, who had still managed to create interstellar ships and powerful weapons, and, thus, dreaming of conquering and ruling others. The Exile did not wish to find himself among such savages. The very thought scared him.

The Metamorphs had no battle fleets, military bases, off-world colonies, or the drive to dominate other races and the thirst for limitless expansion. Such ideas, completely understandable to them, beings of intelligence and logical thought, were, at the same time, foreign to them, incompatible with their psyche and biological nature. However, the galaxy was not a land of justice and peace, and, after the disappearance of the Daskins, had become an arena of clashes and wars, constantly dying down and flaring up anew, whenever new contenders for the role of the masters of the universe wished to demonstrate their ambition and might. Any conflict in the vicinity of the Metamorph's system could end with their destruction or, also a possibility, the enslavement of their species, whose valuable property of mimicry was almost destined to be used for espionage, sabotage, or reconnaissance.

The opposition to such an outcome was not in the area of strength and military engagements, but in the area of secret diplomacy, in the control over aggressive civilizations. They needed to be pushed towards one another, to weaken their passionate impulses and keep them within the borders of their star sectors, sometimes using them for their own protection, destroying even more dangerous creatures using other warlike beings. Such delicate manipulations were performed by the Guard Corps with a small staff of Protectors; taking the shape of different beings, they infiltrated their power structures or sought the ways of influencing the authorities. Such policy had been tested throughout millennia, and, thanks to it, more than one star empire, having soared to the heights of power, had suddenly started to lean towards its decline under the blows of their neighbors or had used up its aggressive fervor in disastrous troubles, rebellions, and civil wars. The Protectors, most of whom were just as crippled as the Exile, were still long-lived beings, capable of influencing on their new world for many centuries, holding back and directing, sometimes even tossing in a useful idea or a technical innovation. In some ways, they protected not only their fellow Metamorphs, but also their charges, fully capable of leading the civilization into the dead end of ecological disasters, planetary wars, and pandemics. That would have been a failure for the Protector, as to hold back and direct did not mean to push towards global destruction.

Metamorphs did not have any public institutions and did not need them any more than they needed centralized authority, military, police, laws, and other fabrications of the primitive races. In their society, the Guard was a unique phenomenon, an organization that protected their planet, but the basis for the structure was not duty but, more likely, sacrifice, even though such an idea was as alien to Metamorphs as the concept of duty. Despite this, dozens of the incurably ill sacrificed themselves to keep their homeworld safe, and the sacrifice seemed enormous, as the lives of the Metamorphs, even in their transformed state, stretched for millennia. A human mind could not fully recognize the scale of their tragedy; maybe being trapped in the body of a snake, a dog, or a rat for a hopeless and indefinite eternity would be a fitting example. If one again used terrestrial analogies, then it could be said that the Metamorphs viewed the Protectors as great heroes.

The Exile, though, was not prone to heroism. Upon receiving his parent's signal, he transported to the Spolders on the southern island and found himself in a clearing overgrown with moss, where a hut, made up of unworked trunks, stood under the gimu trees.

He saw the surrounding landscape with the eyes of the Sorrowful, who had transformed into a Spolder. He would have to speak with them with his help as well, for telepathic communication was not possible for the locals: they spoke by vibrating the air, like most beings in the galaxy. The clearing, where the Exile had ended up, was carefully groomed, as it was just as much a part of the living space as the log cabin and the plantation of edible roots next to it. The white, pink, and lilac moss, covering most of the clearing, seemed like a rug with an exquisite pattern, the gimu trees with multiple aerial roots surrounded it as a living blue wall, and the intervals between the trunks were wider in two places, indicating the start of paths leading into the woods. Clear water glittered in a tiny round pond with a mossy frame, and silver olongs leaned to the water; several bumps were visible in their cool shade. They appeared to serve as chairs; the Exile's parent settled himself on the largest and softest one, next to the host, a Spolder of advanced age, looking like a furry ball with short arms and legs. Except for his beard, he lacked any facial hair; the forehead looked surprisingly high, his nostrils quivered slightly, and dark eyes gleamed under the bulging browridges.

"This is Herald of the Secret Meridian of Perfection," the Sorrowful said, and the Exile recalled that Spolders had very bizarre names. "Herald is a sage, the head of the local community and friend of Stream-among-Stones. He agreed to speak with us."

"The Exile, your offspring?" the Spolder inquired, reaching his six-fingered hand into his beard and glancing at one of his guests, then the other. "The one who wishes to join us? If I recall, you said that there was something wrong with his genes, but, as far as I can tell, he looks to be in full health."

"Most genetic disorders cannot be spotted with the eyes," the Sorrowful explained. "With normal eyes, I mean. To detect them, our specialists... how do you say?.. grow?.. yes, grow special organs to pierce into the nature of the event. Only with their aid—"

"I know, I know!" Herald interrupted him peevishly. "I'm not as ignorant as you might think. Genetic disorders could be reflected in the external appearance or remain hidden, that's all that I meant."

"Yes, of course," the Sorrowful agreed. "I apologize if my tone and words seemed too patronizing. My offspring's condition is that he is capable of only a single transformation. This requires a lot of thought. If he chooses the shape of a Dromi or a Shada, then he will stay like that forever, and if he take the form of a Spolder..."

"...then he will stay a Spolder," Herald continued. "I understand your problem. Your offspring would like to become a perfect being, strong and attractive, gifted with various senses and talents. But how can I help? I am a Spolder, and I am happy with that. I cannot transform into a Dromi, a Shada, or anyone else, to find out if they are better or worse than us. That is something you can do." He thought for a moment, then spoke, stroking his beard. "But does the Exile need a template for his metamorphosis? Why a Spolder, why a Dromi or a Shada, an Eich or a Haptor? One can imagine an ideal or something close to it, a creature full of many advantages that had never existed in the galaxy. Why not? That is an interesting task! Especially from a philosophical standpoint."

"I will not risk undertaking such experiments with my body and psyche," the Exile entered into the conversation. "If only because your ideal creature would be the only one in the galaxy and, therefore, terribly lonely. I wouldn't want that."

"Do you think you will avoid loneliness in the form of a Spolder?" said Herald of the Secret Meridian of Perfection uncertainly. "I doubt it! I can't promise you company, for body shape does not make a Spolder, and you would still differ from us. More than likely, you would cause envy, and then dislike."

"Dislike? But for what reason?" the Exile was full of bewilderment.

"I'm old, I've lived for a hundred and twelve Revolutions and will soon leave our world into the Great Darkness. This is a long life for a Spolder, but you will live a hundredfold longer, which will reveal your nature... I would say, false essence... Do you think this won't be noticed? Do you think this won't cause envy or dislike? There are not that many of us, Exile, and all of us are visible... You can't get lost among us."

The Exile was shaken, for he could not even imagine such a turn of events. But he had no doubt that Herald was speaking earnestly: the Spolder's words came to him through the Sorrowful, but he caught the emotions and the general meaning of his words with his mental sense. Feeling confusion and indecision, he spoke, "Perhaps, I would not stand out so much, if I did what Spolders do. Perhaps that would reconcile us... You could tell me about this? What makes a Spolder?"

"Of course I will!" Herald brightened. "Spolders reflect. On different but inevitably the most important matters."

"For example?"

"For example, the role of sentient beings in the universe. This philosophical problem has two main concepts: according to the first one, sentience is a natural acquisition, appearing the evolutionary way, while the second states that sentience, intellect, individuality have been granted by the Creator, who, perhaps, continues to watch us. Each premise leads to a different notion of our purpose, and, besides, the original postulate itself can be interpreted several ways, in the narrow or broad sense, in terms of morality, logic, positive or irrational knowledge. Let's assume that the second concept is correct, which is my opinion. Then..." Herald brightened even more and started to rise from the bump. "Then we can ask such questions: did the Creator make only us, sentients, or all of Creation with us?.. which goal did He pursue?.. did His goal remain the same or did it change?.. who are we to Him now: a chance to have some fun, trash from a forgotten experiment, or beloved children, whose good behavior He wished to test?.. will we join Him after death, or will He bring some closer and reject the others?.. And, finally, the question of questions: is He knowable for our minds?.. If the answer is negative, then–"

"Creator," the Exile interrupted, stunned by this verbal stream. "You are speaking of the Creator or Creators... Perhaps, you mean the Daskins, the ancient rules of the galaxy?"

"No. Certainly not!"

"Why?"

"Because, if we were created by the Daskins, then who created them?"

Wordplay, the Exile decided, and its limit was obvious: if we were made by the Creator, then who created Him? He shifted, feeling the soft stalks of the moss tickling his skin, and asked, "What else do Spolders do? Besides reflections like this?"

Herald wilted. It seemed that he was not enthusiastic about the other tasks.

"They dance in clearings," he muttered, "grow fruits and vegetables and carve figures out of wood. The young... hmm... they also have things to do... But I don't think this will pique your interest."

"Thank you, Herald," the Exile's parent spoke diplomatically. "Thank you, for this conversation was useful to us... yes, very useful. We have learned many new things, even unexpected things. Now we have something to think about."

Having said good-bye to the Spolder, they transported to their arbor, the Sorrowful took on an Eich's appearance, and spoke.

"My poor child! I feel that you have rejected the thought of becoming a Spolder... And that means that you and I will soon part..."

"We will," the Exile confirmed bitterly. "I make a poor philosopher, and I don't like dancing either."

Thus, the Guard had gained yet another hero.

Despite the perfection of their bodies, the Metamorphs did not reject technology. They had ships for traveling among the stars, tiny mechanisms capable of erecting a city or, turning it to dust, grow gardens at the same place, devices supplying them with food that fit any bodily substance or metabolism type, means of monitoring space and the state of the star, which was known to be unstable, generating magnetic storms and plasma streams. Among this multitude of instruments and devices, there were analogs to terrestrial computers, not quite machines and not quite living beings, whose function was to remember mental images and reproduce them when necessary. The Metamorphs called them deintro, and some were used for learning, others entertained or helped to resurrect what had been forgotten, and yet others stored information about the universe, the galaxy, and the races living in it. The Exile connected to one such device, to study the possibilities of his upcoming and final transformation. This was a Guard deintro, and it could tell him which worlds were, at the moment, in need of Protectors.

If speaking of appearance, functional flexibility, and intellectual potential, then the Exile's preferences leaned towards humanoids. They were not as slender as the Lo'ona Aeo, and not as bulky as the Dromi or the Haptors; their bodies was more complex and perfect than that of the Eichs or the Shada, which promised greater versatility; he also liked their high rate of development, characteristic of humanoid civilizations. Of course, humanoids had the surprising tendency to push themselves into the dead end of global disaster, but several cultures were currently developing upward, and they definitely needed to be watched over. The Kni'lina were already being monitored; their homeworld had been host to a Protector for two hundred years, who had reached the status of Areopagus Shadow, the head of secret service at the imperial court, the Bino Faata also needed to be kept in check: having passed the decline of the Second Eclipse, they were expanding their sector, which, as forecasted by the deintro, could lead to a series of interstellar wars. Additionally, they had located an artifact of the Ancient Race on one of the planets, quasi-sentient beings, which played the role of translators and emotion amplifiers in the Daskin civilization. The find was fortunate, as it led to the development of new technology based on the symbiosis of the quasi-sentient creatures with the chosen Faata caste, capable of mental exchange. This could spur their continued expansion, and leaving such a forecast without attention was thoughtless.

However, after conferring with the Guard experts, the Exile decided that infiltrating this culture would not be effective. The Faata civilization was too rigidly programmed and would be unlikely to succumb to influence from within, even if he became a member of the leading Sheaf, becoming a Pillar of Order or a Strategist, Guardian of the Heavens. He would probably be destroyed the moment he attempted to limit the expansion, as the Faata, having lived through the horror of the Eclipse, considered such policy to be the only means of preventing global crises. But there was still a possibility to influence them from outside, using another race, one potentially as aggressive, but flexible and more suitable for a contact with a Protector. The analysis conducted by the deintro revealed several civilizations capable of becoming a counterbalance, but only one of them was humanoid. A world whose savage inhabitants still called it different names, a planet that would eventually become known as Earth... It was currently in a state of ignorance, but the deintro's forecast promised a rise in seven or eight centuries, for humans were prolific, energetic, arrogant, and extremely resourceful. They were already drawing maps of their continents, knew geometry and medicine, forged steel, wrote books, built giant structures, traded, waged wars, raised cattle, and engaged in a variety of crafts. _A very promising race, these humans!_ the Exile thought. When they invented science and reached the technological stage, someone would have to make room... A few thousand years, and the whole galaxy would recognize them as fully sentient beings!

The choice had been made, and one day, saying goodbye to his parent for the last time and taking the form of a human, the Exile teleported aboard the ship awaiting him at the orbital station. The vessel turned out to be small, for the jump to Earth did not take a long time; besides the pilot, it only fit a container with equipment. The tools and devices, taken by the Exile with him, were miniature and, for the most part, were stored as spores or mechanical embryos: initiating one of the seeds with a thought pulse, he could grow the necessary machine: a deintro, a sigga, a food synthesizer, or a psychic transmitter calibrated for a human brain. Unfortunately, they lacked a natural telepathic gift.

Obeying the Exile's command, the ship performed a jump, submerging into that dimension of the universe where there was no space, no time, no stars or habitable worlds, no light or darkness, no heat or cold. The distance between the planet of the Metamorphs and Sol was huge, but the wanderer had crossed it at the speed of thought. He emerged on the periphery of the system, and, when the ship found the right world, the third from the local star, transported to it with another, very short jump. Then they circled the planet, studying its oceans and continents with the optical devices suitable for the human eye. Being in a new and his final guise, he felt something like an emotional euphoria: the universe, even the tiny world of his ship, opened before the Exile in all the generosity of colors and sounds, smells and tactile sensations. For the first time since he was born, he saw, looked with his own eyes, could speak with the ship and hear its replies not only mentally but through the medium of the air filling the cabin. This seemed so delightful, so unusual and fascinating! Perhaps, the organs of his fellow Metamorphs were more sophisticated, but he no longer thought about his inadequacy: the human senses were sufficient to be a part of the bright, enticing, and uncharted reality, of the existence awaiting him.

One of the planet's hemispheres had two continents: the Northern one was enormous, stretching from the polar ice to the tropical zone, while the Southern one was equatorial, half the area, separated from the northern one by blue seas. The other hemisphere also had two landmasses, although they were smaller, besides them, there was a giant glacier at the pole, and numerous islands, one of which was almost the size of a continent. The Exile focused his attention on the largest continent. Its Western and Southeastern areas were densely populated, and there, using the ship's optics, he made out cities and roads, canals and fields among forests, stone masses of fortresses, as well as rowboats and sailing ships, sliding on rivers and along sea coasts. Both of these regions were, without a doubt, the centers of civilization, but the Western one, with the more capricious landscape and the complex coastlines, seemed more preferable: it was close to the Southern landmass, and, beyond the relatively narrow ocean, lay two more continents, reachable for the natives within a century or two. Besides these notable moments, the Exile noted that, from the Eastern steppes, dense masses of people were moving West on horse and on foot, huge herds of animals and thousands of wagons, an entire city, roving among the sands and the grass. _Settlers, _he thought, directing the ship into the depth of an enormous lake that, many centuries later, would be called Baikal.

By the terrestrial count, it was the beginning of 1219 AD. Genghis Khan's army was on its way to conquer Khwarezmia.

From the ship, securely hidden under the layers of water, the Exile teleported to the army that was moving West and lost himself in the countless crowds, taking on the guise of a warrior, a cattle driver, a shepherd, or a slave. The variations on the appearance of the base organism, a man's body, which he chose, were available to him, unlike radical changes; thus, he would be unable to turn into a woman or any of the animals populating this world with a surprisingly generous flora and fauna. Such a restructuring, requiring changes on the genetic level, the creation of new organs, significant modification of the skeleton and muscle mass, turned out to be beyond him; however, the ability of instantaneous transportation and many new faces made him virtually impossible to catch. He was safe, at least for now, when there were no devices on Earth more complex than a compass or an astrolabe and no weapon greater than a crossbow.

He spent several months in Genghis Khan's army, using his psychic gift to learn the Mongolian, Chinese, and Uyghur languages, spoke with Chinese engineers handling the catapults and ballistae, and learned of the Heavenly Kingdom, currently under the heel of the nomads. A valuable information about terrestrial affairs! Assimilating it, the Exile decided to continue moving with the host, but that was not meant to be; the Mongols crushed Shah Mohammad's army, fell upon the Khwarezmian plains, and a nightmare began. Theoretically, the Exile had been prepared for acts of violence, but the practice turned out to be too bloody, too excruciating for a being that had never known the many horrible faces with which death came to man. The ferocity of the victors frightened him, he jumped West, to the Slavic lands, and found himself in the middle of a conflict between the Prince of Kiev and Veliky Novgorod. Although, this fight was not as brutal: here, in the woods, one could hide, and people were cutting down one another with as much zeal as in Khwarezmia.

For the next several years, he lived through several of Batu Khan's invasions of Rus', the storming and the destruction of Kiev, the Battle on the Ice, and several small wars and clashes, ending with hundreds of people dead, settlements burned to the ground, and prisoners taken away to be enslaved. As the years passed, he got used to the corpses and the blood, fires and permanent devastation, visited the Holy Land, where the Crusaders were fighting the Saracens, went to the countries of Europe and set up several bases in Hanseatic cities, which were the most peaceful and quiet. Now he was Tverdislav of Novgorod, a wax and hemp dealer, the Hamburg merchant Kurt Zee, Peter Albach, the owner of a rope shop in Antwerp, he also kept a loan office in Gdansk under the name Falk the Copper Coin. The flesh of a human had become familiar to him, as did terrestrial landscapes and city views: Venice and Damascus, Granada, Cairo and Paris, Shanghai, Samarkand, Ryazan, and Constantinople. He spent some time in each of them and acquired connections, but gained no friends or lovers. He was lonely, a speck of dust from an alien world, thrown into the sands of Earth's humanity.

Decades had flown away into the past, and, finally, the turbulent 13th century had come to an end; the 14th century was beginning and with it came the Hundred Years' War. That would be its name in the future, and people would say that the French had fought the English, horrify the times of the Jacquerie, praise the exploits of Joan of Arc and the great knights, Chandos and Edward the Black Prince, Bertrand du Guesclin and Rodrigo de Villandrando, Gressard and Bedford. But the Exile, watching these events unfold firsthand and not in one region of Earth, believed that the war had lasted longer than a century and grasped all the nations on the Eurasian continent. The Poles and the Russians fought the Teutonic Order, Dmitry Donskoy battled Mamai and Tokhtamysh, Tamerlane conquered Persia, the Caucasus, Mesopotamia, and Syria, Bayezid's Ottoman Turks reached the Danube and the Hungarian borders, in China, the rulers of the new Ming dynasty were quarreling with the Mongols, civil wars raged in Japan and India, weapons were clanging in Spain and Scotland, in Germany and Italy, Switzerland, Bohemia, and Scandinavia. The wars were accompanied with uncanny regularity by earthquakes and floods, hurricanes, downpours, invasions of locust and pestilence; plague and cholera took away millions of people, and only rats, crows, and wolves remained on the deserted land. Peace and quiet could only be found at cemeteries, and even that was not a guarantee.

Terrible times! But civilization continued moving forward, human existence did not dry out, and the local aborigines, showing their adaptability, survived and even bred and multiplied despite the woes that befell them. That was a stubborn, predatory, hungry, but promising race! But, with all their imperfections, the Exile liked humans. He understood that their shortcomings gave rise to their virtues: thus, for example, greed and thirst for wealth spurred progress, pride and stubbornness were the source of bravery, which, in turn, bore self-sacrifice. He spent many years studying humans, analyzing their past and present, trying to imagine the future with the help of the deintro hidden on his ship; he examined and assessed their motivations, desires, dreams, and that which they considered their mind and their spiritual lives, learned to understand them and correctly anticipate the reaction of their social structures and separate individuals. This was a subtle art; by perfecting it, he was slowly becoming a human himself. However, he was still lonely: even those great minds, to whom he revealed his true nature, were unable to comprehend it, believing that they had met an angel or a demonic messenger.

The Renaissance was beginning, and time started to move forward faster. Hurrying it along, the Exile took up a number of projects: he opened a shop in Nuremberg, where mechanical clocks were being made, invested several hundred thalers into the first printing press in Mainz, suggested the idea for an aircraft to one Florentine painter, and supplied a self-drawn chart, showing lands beyond the ocean, to a young sailor from Genoa. He sailed West with this navigator in the hold of a fragile caravel in the guise of an ordinary sailor named Juan Alvarez. He thought that the first expedition beyond the ocean was too serious an undertaking to leave it to chance, and the Genoese man may have been extremely stubborn, but he still needed mental support in moments of despair. One way or another, they reached the islands near the coast of America; rather, the as yet unnamed continent that, as the Exile hoped, would be colonized within the next several centuries. The colonization was so rapid that, by the 16th and 17th centuries, the newcomers had reduced the native population by a huge margin, and those who survived were being pushed into the deep forests and prairies. The place did not remain empty, however; Indian hunting grounds gave way to tobacco, cocoa, and sugar plantations, and slaves started to be brought in from Africa.

In the 18th century, the progress sped up even more: the law of conservation of matter and the seventh planet of the Solar System, called Uranus, were discovered; besides that, the overseas colonies were freed, and the list of inventions was joined by the lightning rod, the railroad, graphite pencils, and democratic ideas. The latter echoed in Europe with a great massacre: there, under the motto _Liberté, égalité, fraternité_, the champions of freedom were decapitating aristocrats, and one another at the same time. This bloodbath continued into the following century, when the Exile, pretending to a minor official, followed Napoleon on his expeditions: first to Egypt, then Spain, Italy, and Austria, and, finally, to Russia. He remained in this enormous Northern empire until the end of the century, settling down in the Urals as a mine owner and making occasional sorties to the Western countries, to the East of the continent, to Africa or America. Everywhere, especially in Europe, he saw signs of civilization, growing in leaps and bounds and giving birth to the telegraph and telephone, the internal combustion engine, dynamite and machinegun, spiritualism and the theory of surplus value. On the one hand, the progress was undeniable, on the other, it could not end well: new ideas of world domination and social equality, coupled with dynamite and machinegun, were a diabolical explosive mixture.

During the time of World War I and the Russian Revolution, the Exile moved to the quiet Australia. There was no sense in being in the thick of the events he had seen many times before, and he did not wish to risk his life, as it was not only the ideas that were new but also the weapons used to implement them. Neither his psychic gift, nor the ability to alter his face, and not even telekinesis would protect him from a sudden and instant death, a sniper's bullet, a mine explosion, a machinegun burst. He was not afraid of getting wounded, if he retained control over his body and if there were no irreversible brain damage, but who could guarantee that? With a mangled skull, he would be just as dead as an ordinary human; having lost consciousness from the shock, he would bleed to death, while, stepping on a mine, he would be ripped to shreds. And that was why the Exile sat it out in Australia, taking on the appearance of an old farmer named Pete Jones or young Clive Tyrell, studying journalism at the University of Canberra. This profession was promising: according to the deintro forecasts, the appearance of television and radio networks was only a few years away, at which point the influence of mass media on the authorities would grow exponentially.

That was indeed what happened. Besides one more big war and many small ones, the 20th century brought both useful and terrible things in equal measure: on the one hand, quantum theory, airplanes, computers, chemical synthesis, television, nylon, and insulin; on the other, nuclear bombs and missiles, chemical warfare, deadly virus strains, and the unprecedented rise of tensions, for the world had already been divided, but not everyone got the riches and the power. Earth, with its limited supplies of raw materials, was becoming hungry and cramped, and the Exile was already thinking about supplying a few useful hints about the exploration of the Solar System and the manufacture of synthetic products. But he did not have time to do that, as humans came up with ideas like genetic engineering, cloning, the fusion drive, and the planetary computer network on their own. Less than a century after the first Moon landing, human expeditions were reaching Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto, while settlements were being established on Mercury, Mars, and Venus, and industrial development began in the Asteroid Belt. The problems remained the same, but, accounting for the rapid technological progress, the breadth of the Solar System and the enormity of its resources, these problems no longer threatened the existence of humankind. In general, neither internal unrest and local wars, nor the depletion of ore deposits, not even asteroids or comets, which could approach Earth and destroy civilization and lives. _Just a little longer,_ the Exile thought, _only two or three hundred years, and we'll reach the stars, settle suitable planets, build cities in space, and forget about squabbles and wars. The galaxy is enormous, there's enough room for everyone, including a new star-faring race! A little longer… just a little…_

And then the Faata came.

The Exile, or rather Gunther Voss and his other terrestrial incarnations, had no information about them for the past eight centuries. A large time period for humanoid civilizations! During that time, humans had moved from the shores of Europe to Pluto, from wooden sailboats to interplanetary ships, from pathetic superstitions to the true picture of Creation. However, the Faata had also not remained idle and were not being stagnant. This seemed obvious within the first several minutes, when the Exile, under the guise of Liu Chang, caught the distant flash of antimatter annihilation and, using the Kepler Observatory's telescope, recorded it on pictures. The Faata technology was superior to that of Earth, and, obviously, their development had also been exponential; after all, they had managed to cross the Void between the galactic arms! This was not too impressive in itself, as a ship, submerging into Limbo, could cross enormous distances, but the necessity of such a step was evidence that the Faata sector was expanding and that the sphere of their interest had reached the Solar System. In this situation, the humans' chances of creating their own empire dropped down to zero, which meant that they would not eventually become the counterbalance to the Faata.

In Gunther Voss's opinion, the most frightening thing was their genetic similarity to humans. If humans and Bino Faata could produce offspring (of which he had little doubt), the absorption of the human race by the highly advanced aliens was unavoidable. The fact that there were billions of humans and few Faata was irrelevant: their ship was likely equipped with a sperm bank and incubators for accelerating the reproductive cycle. In the eugenic sense, the policy of their leaders was extremely strict, and Voss believed that it hadn't changed in eight centuries: the Faata reproduced the ruling caste and several soldier and worker castes, being reminiscent of a beehive or other social insects. At the same time, they remained physiologically humanoid and retained a human-like appearance, which also brought danger: humans would rather trust other humanoids than a shapeshifting creature.

He would have destroyed them if he could. But, besides the psychological inability to kill, Voss lacked weapons capable of striking down the Faata at interplanetary distances. He acted as a Protector should: using the strength and might of the race which he had grown close to in all these centuries, he attempted to stop the aliens far from Earth, in the Asteroid Belt or beyond the Martian orbit. It was possible that he would be able to deal with them on Earth (he had several backup options in that case), but that would result in destruction and casualties. Earth, with its giant population and metropolises, was hardly a place for space battles: a plasma or an antimatter strike would kill millions, without distinction of who was right and who was wrong.

However, there was a hope to avoid these terrible options, taking control of the Faata ship. The ship was controlled by a quasi-sentient beast, similar to a bio-computer; this legacy of the Daskins, abandoned as unnecessary, obeyed those of its new symbiotes more readily who had a higher psychic potential. Actually, this circumstance is what separated a portion of the Faata into the ruling caste, capable of controlling the quasi-sentients; all the others served as their appendages, connecting to the psychic link using a special device called a kaff. It didn't work too well for humans, but the arsenal of the Exile/Voss had a more powerful device, the tiny sphere of a mental transmitter, which he teleported aboard the ship.

_A chance!.._ Voss thought, sending his Greek gift. The universe was full of chances, and the one who used them, with reasonable care, of course, would win out. The human cruiser, which accidentally encountered the Faata, had been destroyed, but three humans had been taken captive: two men and a woman. One of men had died, resisting a psychic invasion into his mind, while the woman, after being artificially inseminated, had been placed into an incubator; the third captive remained, surprisingly stubborn, embittered, but not at all stupid. Also a chance! If he ended up using the psychic transmitter, then…

But that's where the favorable chances had ended; Pavel Litvin, the Exile's protégé, had been unable to subjugate the quasi-mind. After that, there was a battle with a human flotilla, its destruction, and the landing in the Antarctic. Everything was following the worst-case scenario, and the Exile/Voss resigned himself to the fact that casualties were inevitable. He transported a sigga, a container with eating minirobots, to the ship, Litvin activated them, and destroyed the quasi-sentient creature. The resulting cataclysm was terrible… Forty-three million dead, hundreds of cities in ruins, irreparable losses: ancient temples and palaces, paintings and statues, films and books, works of art… But the main loss was the forty-three million people! But he was able to save Litvin, Litvin and the women, Yo and McNeil, the former captive, who was carrying a Faata fetus.

At that, Gunther Voss, a reporter for the _CosmoSpiegel_, put an end to his activities and vanished; astronomer Liu Chang, diplomat Umkhonto Tlume, and USF ground base officer Roy Bunch disappeared along with him. But other personas appeared, seven or eight of them, among them were Klaus Siebel, a trainee of the Secret Service, and the miracle surgeon Chaim Dayan, a nasolarynx specialist. At the appointed time, Dayan performed an operation on Klaus Siebel; where and when, in which Israeli underground clinic, remained a secret, but the result was evident: Seibel was now able to speak Faata'liu, the language of the aliens. Now his career was secure: advancement, access to any materials, contact with Litvin and Yo, supervision over Abby McNeil's offspring, and anything else that had even a remote connection to the Faata and the Metamorph Gunther Voss… As an officer of the Secret Service, he persisted in searching for himself, not forgetting to age when necessary and improve his mastery of the Faata language, speaking with young Paul Corcoran. "What did you say, boy? T'taia orr n'uk'uma sirend'agi patta? Yes, I understand… A sirend came out to the sun and is basking in the warmth of the stones… My pronunciation is good? Well, thank you for that. Eit t'tesi… I am glad…"

Time no longer crawled, didn't drag on, like in centuries past, but ran forward at a rapid pace: one moment, and young Paul was no longer so young, another moment, and he was a space fleet officer, a married man, then a family man. Two little girls were climbing onto the knees of Uncle Klaus, interrupting one another to tell him how they had found a frog or a lizard in the garden… Two women, Corcoran's mother and wife, were looking at them from the terrace, smiling, setting plates, preparing breakfast: Abby was holding a coffee pot, while Vera was carrying a plate with pastries… Where was Paul? Soaring somewhere in the cosmic abyss on the way to Baal or Sirius, Telemachus or Barnard's Star… And he was no longer Paul, for a long time now, but Commander Corcoran, First Officer aboard the cruiser _Europe_…

Something was maturing in the heart of Klaus Siebel, the Protector of Earth, something partly human, partly inherited from distant ancestors, from his sad parent, whom he would probably never see again. Such a strong and unfamiliar feeling! But, turning to the past, to that half of him that remained a Metamorph exile, he understood; his ancient instinct of procreation was waking up. As a cripple, he would be unable to procreate himself, even if he returned to his true nature, but that was a different connection, spiritual, not corporeal, and he felt these connections grow stronger year after year.

Perhaps he had turned into a human. Perhaps he had remained who he was, but the time of his loneliness was over.

"Thank you," Corcoran said. "Thank you for telling me this. I'm touched by your trust."

Siebel nodded, seemingly as a sign of gratitude. For the next two or three minutes, they sat in silence and quiet, then Corcoran, glancing at the timer, reached out and turned on the intercom.

"A change of the watch is coming, Klaus. Tell me… all this time… all these insanely long centuries… have you ever had anyone? A friend, a pupil, a woman?"

"No," Siebel said, "no."

"Has something changed?"

"Possibly. I–"

A rustling noise came from the communication device's vocoder, followed by Executive Officer Praagh's voice.

"No incidents during my watch. I stand relieved!"

"I have the conn," Nikolay Tumanov called back. "There's fresh coffee, Selina. Still hot."

"Thanks. I'm going to enjoy it."

Clicking the intercom key, Corcoran looked at Siebel. Or was it the Exile? _Does it matter?_ he thought. It wasn't about the name and not even about the physical appearance. Trust and understanding, these things were much more important.

There was a smile on his friend's face. Tilting his head, he was listening to something, as if Selina Praagh's voice continued to be heard in the small cramped cabin.

"I wanted to say that this face," Siebel touched his cheek, "is not a constant. If I grow younger by ten… maybe twenty years… if I tell her everything… Do you think she will be scared?"

Now it was Corcoran's turn to smile.

"She won't." After a beat, he added. "Eit t'tesi… I'm glad that you're having thought like that."


	6. Chapter 5

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (__Ответный__удар__) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Chapter 5**

**Gamma Malleus**

The _Europe_'s observation room was huge. It was located on deck A, immediately aft of the bridge; it was the size of a soccer field, covered by a film screen, mirroring the shape of the outer hull. Currently, the room seemed like a window opened to space; alien constellations blazed in the depth of the screen, and it was difficult to believe that up there, above them, was not a transparent dome but the ship's indestructible armor with dozens of video sensors. Corcoran, having served on the _Europe_, remembered the room empty, if one didn't count the general crew line-ups, admiral parades, and other official events. But today, there was not a lot of available space. In the far end of the room, near the bulkhead separating it from the bridge, he saw lights blinking on the control panel for the SADs [_SAD stands for "small autonomous drone", a tiny rocket with devices capable of scanning in the visual and radio bands._], or Owls, as they were called in the fleet; in the middle, there were hemispheres, mounted on brackets, used for visual observation, connected to telescopes, and other equipment used by the science team; there were two rows of desks along the walls, four food dispensers, a portable bathroom with a shower, and several couches. Someone was sleeping in one of them; the Research Corps specialists had been working here for days, and it didn't look like they came down to the living deck to rest.

A portion of the room, separated by large square screens, was equipped for meetings. There were hard plastic chairs, holoprojector columns, a portable terminal of the shipboard Ultranet, and Loudmouth Ben, a translation device designed to ease communications with the Faata. The whole area was covered by a sound absorbing field; Corcoran could watch the astrophysicists, xenologists, and linguists working their equipment, but not a word or a rustle passed through the invisible sound barrier. They were in plain sight here, but, at the same time, completely isolated. The Commodore sat, stretching out his long legs, Corcoran and Joaquin Ibáñez, the head of the _Europe_'s scientific sector, stood, watching the screens, Asenov, the expert xenologist, was working his magic at the terminal.

"Continue, Dr. Ibáñez," Vrba said, nodding his head with blond cropped hair slightly. His hair shone gold, as if the commander of the expedition picked it out specifically to match the color of his chevrons and uniform clasps.

"Yes, my commodore. Please, diagram seven… yes, excellent… thank you, Señor Ivan." Ibáñez, a swarthy, dark-eyed Galician, had a distinct impeccable politeness of the old Spanish kind: he called his subordinates "señor" or "colleague", while his superiors were "dons" and "caballeros" to him. "And so, we are looking at the Gamma Malleus system, the result of three days of observation. An hour ago, we have received the most recent data from the _Africa_ and the _Asia_ from the SADs they had launched. I believe, caballeros, that all objects of interest have been detected and their trajectories clarified. Up to and including the asteroids that can be detected from so far away."

_Three days!.. just three days!_ Corcoran thought. _Well done!_ The expedition's scientific sector was, without a doubt, one of the best. Listening to Ibáñez's rapid-fire speech, he examined the diagrams, charts, and tables with the parameters of planetary orbits appearing on the screens. Upon exiting the timeless Limbo, the squadron was performing a reconnaissance of the Gamma Malleus neighborhood. The ships drifted in the condensations of the comet area, far from the inner planets; here, like in the Solar System, the distance between the central star and the Oort cloud was about one light month, but, instead of two large swarms, there were eight, presenting a lot of opportunities to hide quickly and securely. Comets, some dust and rocks, cemented by the frozen gases, were distributed unevenly in the cloud, and gaps between the swarms reached hundreds of billions of kilometers. However, there was no better chance to secretly monitor the system; this far away, through the swarm, no sensor would locate any alien ships. To speed up the work, the _Asia_ and the _Africa_ had jumped to two clusters on the other side of the local star, and SADs had been launched above and below the ecliptic to increase the accuracy of the results.

"Eight planets," Ibáñez said, demonstrating yet another diagram. "Eight, if we count the three stellar bodies very close to the star. Very small ones: their mass is two or three times less than Mercury's, while the distance to the sun is a quarter of an AU. This is the orbital radius of the third planetoid."

"I take it the two others are, obviously, invisible," Corcoran spoke.

"Let's say unobservable, Don Capitán. The first of them is nearly in the star's corona, while the other one is close to it and very small. Their orbits have been calculated based on the perturbations in the motion of the third planetoid. These bodies do not present any interest to us, given our mission. No water, no atmosphere, gravity approximately 0.1_g_, monstrous temperatures… 500 Celsius on the surface of the third planetoid… at least 500."

No interest, Corcoran agreed silently: any activity, base construction or ore mining, would be difficult and, therefore, unprofitable. Vrba, obviously, held to the same opinion; he waved his hand and spoke.

"Continue, Doctor."

"Then, caballeros, we have two Earth-like worlds with oxygen atmospheres. I believe that the fourth one, the warmer one, is Ro'on, while the fifth is T'har, but even its climate conditions are quite acceptable: the average temperature is above freezing. On Ro'on, it's 18°C… slightly warmer than on Earth… [_The average temperature on Earth's surface is 15°C._] Distance to the star is 0.77 AU, gravity is 0.9_g_, period of rotation is 28.3 hours, and there are 320 days in a year."

"Artificial structures?" the Commodore asked curtly, turning his gaze towards Asenov.

The xenologist shrugged.

"Nothing, sir, that would be possible to detect from here within the cloud. No cities, no large orbital structures near the planet. And there is almost nothing on the radio bands."

"According to the available data," Corcoran said quietly, "the Bino Faata of the Third Phase have no cities. No entertainment familiar to us either. We can't expect to intercept some TV or radio transmissions with useful information."

"You ought to know, Captain. You're our expert in this."

Vrba turned to him, his stern face continuing to be imperturbable, but the corners of his lips twitched into a smile. Based on his experience with him, Corcoran knew that Karel Vrba did not give out smiles for naught. In fact, he did nothing for naught or just because, and even the psychic gift did not always allow him to catch his intentions, hints, or actions that would follow shortly. As befitted a good military commander, Karel Vrba was full of surprises.

But this time his thought seemed understandable: he remembered shipyard DX-51, aboard the _Europe_, and a young Lieutenant Commander reporting to his quarters. "They have high expectations for you, Corcoran... When we head to the star systems, where the Faata colonies are located…"

Well, so we had! And we were here! Now what?

"We are listening, Ibáñez," came the Commodore's calm voice.

"The sixth and seventh satellites are Mars-type planets. No atmosphere, their mass is 20% of Earth's, rocks, sand, arid deserts, low temperatures… But they are suitable for setting up bases."

"An asteroid belt?"

"There is none here. There are separate asteroids, but none of them approaches the size of Hygiea or Psyche, much less Ceres or Pallas [_Minor planets, also some of the largest asteroids in the Solar System: 1 Ceres (950 km in diameter), 2 Pallas (544 km), 10 Hygiea (380 km), 16 Psyche (240 km)._] The largest… Señor Asenov, images, please… Here! This one has the diameter of 98 kilometers, and there are four more, between 50 and 70 kilometers in size. The others are smaller. No observable exact location in space, as for the quantity… well, from this distance, we have detected about a hundred. There are more massive bodies orbiting the eighth planet, but even here the scale is smaller than at home, nothing like Ganymede, Titan, Triton, or even Tethys. Several dozen irregular-shaped moons, with the sizes ranging from 20 to 180 kilometers. Señor Asenov… yes-yes, this image… the largest satellite against the backdrop of the planet… it masses 6 x 10-5, if we compare it to Luna… and here is another, 150 kilometers in diameter…"

"They appear to be the largest asteroids that have been captured from space, correct?" Vrba asked.

"Without a doubt, my commodore. The mass of the outer planet is thirty percent greater than Jupiter's, its pull is great… Gas giants, if they exist, clean up the garbage in any star system. And this is a typical gas giant: hydrogen, helium, methane, ammonia, and radio emissions at the wavelength of 3 centimeters [_Jupiter's radio emissions at the wavelength of 3 cm were discovered in 1956; it is caused by the motion of charged particles in the planet's atmosphere._]. However, the atmosphere appears to be calmer than Jupiter's; it lacks any analogs to Io, and the largest moon orbits it a million kilometers away [_A number of the turbulent effects in the Jovian atmosphere are caused by Jupiter's proximity to the massive satellite Io, which is larger and more massive than Earth's Moon (its mass is 1.2 times that of the Moon, its diameter is 3640 km, and the distance to Jupiter is 422,000 km)._].

"The fourth," Asenov grunted, leaning over the terminal. "The fourth satellite, Joaquin."

"Yes-yes, of course, my colleague. Put the images on these screens, please. General view, then the area of the phenomenon, and the result of computer processing." Smoothing his dark hair, Ibáñez explained. "The fourth satellite of the gas giant, which we have named Obscurus, appears to be inhabited, and there is some meaningful activity taking place in the vicinity; unfortunately, caballeros, we don't know what it is. The distance is too great to distinguish tiny objects. We were able to increase the resolution with the use of interpolating software, but not by much. Here, look!"

A dark rock with a wrinkled, cracked surface was slowly spinning on the first screen. Obscurus's shape looked like a roughly carved tetrahedron, whose four vertices appeared to be smoothed out or cleaved, sinuous mountain ridges stretched along the edges, and the bases represented a semblance of triangular planes without any noticeable details. However, a series of shots at maximum magnification, which Asenov had pulled up on the second screen, showed that the impression of flatness and smoothness was illusive. In the weak light, streaming from the huge disc of the gas giant, dark shadows were visible; some were probably cast by hills, cliffs, and even mountains, others could have been chasms, large canyons, or craters, caused by meteorite impacts. One of these spots had the shape of a blurred ellipse. Based on the scale grid, overlaid on the image, it reached twenty kilometers in length and eight-and-a-half in width. This formation had some sort of internal structure: barely-noticeable points of light were visible in the darkness hiding it, and it seemed that the darkness was an enormous shaft or a tunnel, piercing the planetoid, and the sparks of light were the stars, hanging in the immeasurable distances. The interpolating software, possessing intuition and near-human imagination, cleared up the picture: the third screen showed that some of the dots were grouped along curved trajectories, while others were scattered in complete disarray.

"Some sort of astroenginering complex?" the Commodore asked.

"It's possible," Asenov replied; he had obviously been studying this phenomenon. "Unfortunately, sir, neither the _Africa_ nor the _Asia_ see the moons of the outer planet, as it's on the other side of the sun from them. Here," the xenologist nodded at the screens, "is the summary of the results of only our observations, and I can tell you that I have squeezed everything I could from the equipment and the software."

"Any hypotheses?"

The xenologist chuckled.

"A dozen or so. A space mine, a settlement, or an entire city, a penal colony, a processing plant, a station for monitoring the space beyond the outer planet, a military base, or all of the above."

"Perhaps the object has nothing to do with the Faata," Ibáñez added. "A strange natural phenomenon or a Daskin artifact… We'll find out when we get closer."

"We're not getting closer now." Vrba stood up. He was lean and very tall, a head taller than his subordinates. "Dr. Ibáñez, Dr. Asenov…" A slight nod. "Thank you. Joaquin, send all the results to the rest of the squadron. You are dismissed."

"Yes, sir."

Ibáñez and Asenov left the meeting area. Corcoran looked up; there, on the ceiling screen, the starry sky was spread out to its full width. The sight was not as impressive as it was on Earth or Gondwana, for the chasm separating the two galactic arms seemed to be a grim river that had swept away the faint sparks of the stars with its dark current. The orange sun of Ro'on and T'har, as yet nameless, looked to be the brightest flame among the glowing embers of this celestial bonfire. The outlines of three cruisers were visible against the dark background: the _Australia_ was the closest, followed by the _America_ and the _Antarctica_. The _Litvin_, docked to the _Europe_, remained out of sight.

"We'll remain here and wait," the Commodore spoke. "You will go to Ro'on. It's most likely a more populated world, the center of the local civilization… Then again, this is only a suggestion not an order. Talk it over with Siebel, Paul. T'har has its own advantages, since we have at least some data on it. We can guess what awaits you there."

Talk it over with Siebel… Pulling himself away from contemplating the starry sky, Corcoran looked at the Commodore's face. It was unmoved. _Does he know?.._ a thought came. Based on Vrba's mental pulses, which didn't contain any special emotions, he was not in on Siebel's secret. Something, maybe a sense of anticipation, which had awakened so suddenly on the Silmarri ship, told Corcoran that only he knew that secret. He did not wish to think about the reason for such trust. Siebel was his friend, of course, but…

"I will discuss the route with Siebel, but I think, sir, that your recommendation is correct," he said. "T'har has only one ruling Sheaf, while Ro'on, if Yo was not mistaken, has three. Three continents and three Pillars of Order. More possibilities, more information."

"Information, yes…" Vrba's eyes, sliding along Loudmouth's massive shape, became thoughtful. "Before we do anything, we need information, for we know too little. An enemy needs to be studied. What if, upon looking closer, the enemy becomes an ally or, at least, a neutral party, like the Lo'ona Aeo… So, let's not rush in with plasma throwers and annihilators. These are very powerful tools, Paul. I would say, irreversible."

He fell silent, staring at the screens, still displaying the dark, fuzzy outline of Obscurus. The thoughts going through his head were understandable to Corcoran: Vrba was remembering his brother and father, killed in the Battle of the Martian Orbit, the destroyed Prague, the millions of casualties, the dead and the mutilated; he remembered all that and fought his hatred. For him, the simplest decision would probably have been an annihilator, but he did not wish to invoke his right of vengeance. At least, not yet.

"Do you want me to land on the planet?" Corcoran asked after a long period of silence.

"Yes, if you deem it necessary. You have a week and the Faata module. Besides, you know their language and, in some respects, you yourself…" Vrba didn't finish. "You don't have to make contact with them, but we need intelligence and a geopolitical overview. They have no cities, but there must be industrial and control centers, defense nodes, astrodromes, gathering places for t'ho and members of the higher caste… If Ro'on has three Pillars of Order, then are there any disagreements between them? Perhaps, one of them is more peaceable than the others? More tolerant? More inclined to cooperate? After all, both of our races are humanoid."

"I understand, sir." Corcoran nodded, and his memory obligingly reminded him of another detail from their first meeting, there on shipyard DX-51. "What will I have to do?" "Whatever the situation demands…" It was possible that landing on Ro'on was a useless and suicidal task, but he needed to try. Vrba was right: an annihilator was an irreversible argument.

The Commodore turned to the screens, showing the lump that was Obscurus, and said, "One more thing: take a look at what they're building there. But carefully, without revealing your presence. Load up on a dozen Owls, and launch them if observation is necessary."

"Am I to communicate with the squadron using data probes?" Corcoran asked. "In case we are unable to return?"

"Yes. But I hope you'll be able to return." Vrba unclasped his breast pocket and took out a pouch with a tiny chip that looked like a golden scale. "Here, take this. It has a program for the cybersurgeon."

Corcoran grimaced.

"Will it give me implants? I'm afraid my wife won't like that!"

"No implants. You look like a Faata, except your hair is red, and the eyes are gray. That we will fix. You'll be a handsome dark-haired man like Ibáñez. Your wife won't mind."

"But my kids might not recognize me," Corcoran muttered, saluted, and left for his ship.

The outer planet was hovering in the viewscreen, like a cloudy sphere of frosted glass, touched by an artist's brush, which added a pink stroke here, a blue or brown one there. The _Commodore Litvin_, a tiny grasshopper, having jumped from the darkness of the comet cloud to the white opalescent sphere, was gaining on it with every passin hour, as if falling into the mouth of a giant shaft, filled with dim light and a chaotic movement of colored stripes and spots. It seemed as if the shaft was cut into the black obsidian of the cosmic darkness and led to such outskirts of the universe where even the ancient Daskins had never been.

It was Second Navigator Oki Yamaguchi's watch; Bai Ling was on the bridge with him. The two other pilots, Bo Santini and Yegor Seriy, were in the wardroom with the other senior officers, watching the white spot grow and gradually turn from a flat disk into something with volume, bulging, wrapped in a dense layer of atmosphere, and clouds of methane and ammonia. This world, related to Jupiter by mass, volume, and chemical composition, appeared different from it: this planet rotated slower, was not as flattened at the poles, and lacked anything similar to the Great Red Spot and the system of stripes parallel to the equator [_Jupiter's period of rotation is about 10 hours (the shortest of all planets in the Solar System), and, due to the fast rotation of the powerful gaseous atmosphere, the planet is flattened at the poles. Its other special features include the Great Red Spots and stripes parallel to the equator._]. In his lifetime, Corcoran had seen a couple dozen such gas giants, failed stars, and all of them appeared somewhat defective to him: no heat or light, like from the Sun, no life or intelligence, like on Earth. But a rich supply of raw materials; almost unlimited, in fact.

Klaus Siebel, sitting under Commodore Litvin's portrait, stood up and started brewing coffee. He did it masterfully, obviously having practiced in the task for several centuries. Fragrant aroma flowed through the air, there was a subtle clinking of porcelain. Siebel, filling the cups, gave the first one to Selina with a bow. Then came the turn for Corcoran and the pilots. Tumanov, having refused coffee, got himself a glass of juice from the dispenser, downed it, and grunted into the intercom, "Oki! Are the moons visible yet?"

"Only the large ones. I am clarifying their trajectories."

"Do you need help?"

"I can manage. By the way, we have the results from the spectral analysis."

"I'd like to see them," Corcoran said, sipping his coffee.

"Yes, sir. Pulling them up on your screen."

A column of symbols and numbers appeared to the left of the planet, on the film screen set up in the wardroom. Hydrogen – 72%, helium – 25%, methane – 1.2%, ammonia – 0.7%... Then came ethane, acetylene, phosphine, ammonium sulfide, and water vapor, all in trace amounts.

"A lot more methane and ammonium than on Jupiter," Siebel said.

"Six or seven times more," the senior pilot Seriy confirmed. "I've flown near Papa Jove before, may it be damned! I still remember the atmospheric composition down to the thousandths." After a beat, he added. "I was almost crushed in a Peregrine there. Marinich's expedition, back in '17, when we were trying to get to the Red Spot."

"You flew with Marinich?" Praagh raised her thin eyebrows. "Wow! I had no idea!"

"Need to brush up on the crewmember files," Corcoran said. "It's a first officer's duty to know everything about everyone."

"Even you, sir?" Selina asked sarcastically.

"Naturally. But within the limits of the file."

Siebel looked at him with a smile. There were multiple versions of their personnel files: some were kept in the fleet archives, in the computers of the _Europe_ and the _Commodore Litvin_, while others, ones closer to the truth, could be found in the USF Secret Service database. But even those, if one spoke of Siebel, contained about a penny's worth of truth.

"The information on the seven largest moons has been processed," Oki's voice was heard from the intercom. "I'm sending the orbital parameters."

The screen was covered by a ripple of numbers, labels, and symbols. Based on the clarified data, Obscurus, the fourth and most mysterious satellite, orbited the planet at a distance of half a million kilometers, but it wasn't the closest moon: there were two more, almost the same size but with smaller orbital radii. Besides the seven larger planetoids, there were other bodies spinning around the protostars, several dozen rocky, icy, or metallic boulders, which were being tracked by the frigate's video sensors, sending the information to the ANS. While the _Litvin_ was extremely maneuverable, it was still dangerous to rush into the swarm of the giant's satellites without calculating their trajectories.

The enormous planet was already taking up half the screen, when the on-duty navigator announced, "I think that's everything, Captain. If something is omitted, then it's no larger than a pebble, on my honor as a samurai!" Then he added. "Thirteen minutes and forty seconds until the end of the watch."

He was tired, Corcoran realized, catching the mental vibes flowing from Yamaguchi. He touched the minds of his crew for a moment. They were all at their battle stations and at full readiness: Pelevich was manning the annihilator, the gunners were in the turrets, Hernandez was in engineering, Linder was in the med bay, and Communications Officer Dupressis was in his cubbyhole next to the wardroom. Then again, there was nothing for him to hear: no radio signals, except for the emissions in the 3-cm band.

"You'll be relieved shortly, Oki," Corcoran spoke and turned to Tumanov. The first navigator was eight years his senior and, besides his priceless experience, was known to be careful and composed. "Here's what we'll do: let's enter an orbit of five-six hundred megameters, but on the other side of the planet, outside of Obscurus's observation zone. We'll launch SADs; two should be enough, I think. We'll put one up as a repeater and send the other to the object. What do you say, Nikolay?"

"Sounds reasonable." Tumanov rubbed his balding scalp. "All right, I'll go crunch some numbers, Captain."

"A moment. Praagh, any thoughts? How about you pilots?"

Selina shook her head, Bo shrugged. Seriy made a suggestion, "Can't we do without the Owls? Boniface and I can take a look for ourselves in Peregrines."

"Too much risk," Tumanov objected. "A Peregrines is a lot bigger than a SAD. Also, its life support system would produce emissions, easier to detect… What's the benefit?"

"The benefit is in personal impressions. There's no substitute for them. When I was descending to Jove… or landing on Minerva at Arcturus… or…" The pilot waved his hand. "Anyway, I had plenty of impressions then."

"That's what we don't need." Corcoran stood up and pushed away his empty cup. Uncle Pavel was looking down at him from the wall with a strict expression, as if reminding him: your time has come, son. _It's been a long time coming,_ a thought came, and he, frowning, continued. "All right, people: Tumanov is on the ANS, Seriy is at the controls, Praagh is on watch, keeping a data probe ready, Siebel and I are observing. Bo, you will remotely fly the Owls from the auxiliary bridge. Can you handle both?"

"I can handle four, Captain. Those birds are pretty obedient."

Saluting, Santini dashed into the narrow hallway. He was followed by Praagh, Tumanov, and the senior pilot. Siebel stayed behind.

"Attention, crew!" Corcoran said, leaning towards the communicator's vocoder. "The watch is being changed. Green Alert [_Green Alert is the preparatory stage before the Red Alert._], all sections to report readiness in ten minutes."

"Do you feel anything?" Siebel asked. He was still standing on the threshold. He wagged his finger at his temple and asked again. "Right here? Anything at all?"

"No."

"Okay. We'll talk later."

Squeezing one after the other onto the bridge, they lowered into their seats, right into the tight embrace of their cocoons. All sections reported in due course: Tumanov, Hernandez, Pelevich, Praagh. Dupressis reported that no intelligent activity was being detected in space, no broadband radio signals, no coded pulses; only the cosmic background radiation and the 3 cm emissions. Bo Santini called out next: two Owls were already in the launch tubes. The ANS console winked red lights at Corcoran, then being replaced by green ones, and the pilot control panel was illuminated by a dim flash.

"Course plotted," Tumanov said.

"Course accepted."

Seriy's hands danced over the panel, the planet's enormous sphere started slipping to the side, to the edge of the viewscreen, then there was a quiet click from the ANS, and numbers appeared in the light column next to his controls. Distance to the object, velocity components, linear and angular acceleration, position in space… Gravity aboard the ship remained normal; its fluctuations were compensated for by the artificial gravity generator. The sensor screen's round eye was calmly glowing; there were no rocks, no dust, no other space garbage ahead of the ship, and the same was true of artificial objects.

There was a sharp chord, and the pilot's hands came down. Now the ship was flying on automatic; its trajectory was gradually bending, twisting around the planetary sphere, sensitive video cameras were tracking this foggy world, sending the data to the onboard computer's memory. They were fifteen hundred megameters from the dense layers of the atmosphere. The side screens, showing maximum magnification, displayed monstrous flocks of clouds, glowing silver in the light of the distant sun.

"The turbulence here is not as noticeable," Tumanov said. "There are eddy currents and twisters, but…" Squinting, he stared at the analysis data running along the bottom of the screen. "But nothing comparable to Jupiter. Calm atmosphere."

"This is what the specialists on the _Europe_ predicted," Corcoran noted. "The planetoid masses are negligible, and there are no noticeable tidal forces or other perturbations."

Siebel shifted in the tight embrace of his cocoon.

"And what follows from this?"

"It's possible to fly there," Seriy grunted. "Without descending too deep, but above, without any problems or risk. Easy!"

"Possible to fly," Siebel repeated. "Hydrogen, methane, helium, acetylene, even water, plenty of resources, plus minerals on the moons, all the sources necessary for chemical synthesis… And it's possible to fly! This suggests a thought."

"You think it's a factory with a transportation network?" Corcoran proposed. "They're scooping raw materials from the atmosphere, mining metal on the moons, ferry it to Obscurus, and produce something?"

"Vacuum toilets, for example," the pilot suggested.

"We'll see." Siebel chuckled vaguely. "Hydrocarbons are an amazing thing, Yegor, one can make anything from them, with appropriate knowledge, of course. Food, fabric, plastic… And if one adds mineral resources, the spectrum grows significantly. Basically, any of the excesses and luxuries that we know back on Earth."

"A transportation network requires communication. Traffic control, pilot commands, identification signals, etc. And we," Tumanov glanced at the silent intercom, "we hear absolutely nothing: neither conversations nor any other meaningful signals. Although, at such distance and with our equipment…"

Silence fell on the bridge. Corcoran kept glancing at his monitors and at the captain's control panel with the dark recess of the pentalion, trying to remember which methods of communication the Faata possessed. Uncle Pavel had spoken of the kaff, a telepathic amplifier, but he hadn't seemed to encounter any radio equipment. As for the experts, who had studied the Faata starship, they had found normal systems, oriented towards the radio contact with Earth and monitoring of TV and radio stations. There had been nothing of the sort in battle modules, and the question of how the ship had maintained communications with their pilots remained unanswered. It was obvious that it was not with the use of the means employed in the Solar System. No radio, no laser pulses, no other emissions within the known bands… Psychic technology? Possibly. Klaus would have to know that…

He attempted to touch Siebel's mind, hitting a strong barrier as usual. Then again, several thoughts slipped through this block: wait, my friend, don't rush.

Nearly an hour passed in the tense silence, occasionally interrupted by Siebel and Selina Praagh's remarks. The pilot and the navigator worked in silence, maneuvering above the planetary atmosphere and trying to move the frigate to some small satellite to give them a better hiding spot. Finally, Seriy sighed in relief, stretched as far as his cocoon cover would allow, and reported.

"We're in orbit, Captain. Five hundred and twenty megameters from the center of this bastardy star. The period of rotation is eighteen-point-three hours."

"The object is on the other side of the planet and is slowly gaining on us, but the speed of convergence is small," Tumanov added. "We don't have to worry about anything for three days."

"More than enough time," Corcoran spoke. "Selina, is the probe ready?"

"Yes, sir."

"Santini, what do you have?"

"I'm at full readiness. My button finger's itching," came from the intercom.

"Send the scouts."

The _Commodore Litvin_ shuddered slightly. Two small cylinders flew out of the launch tubes, unfolded their twin antennae, making them really look like owls with large round eyes, and rapidly vanished into the darkness. Praagh immediately switched the image: now the left side screen was filled with the enormous disk of the planet, while the viewscreen and the right monitor, which were showing the signals coming from the SADs, displayed stars and the mournful ribbon of the Void between the galactic arms. The gravity drives accelerating the Owls were simultaneously supplying the sensor equipment and a tiny pulse transmitter with power. It was believed that it was impossible to detect it: the signal stream was tightly focused, the pulses were low-frequency, while the intermediate picture was being filled in by the interpolating program unit of the onboard computer.

These tiny scouts were moving at an incredible speed: flying in the same orbit as the _Litvin_ and the six-kilometer rock, hiding the frigate, they were closing with Obscurus at the rate of ten megameters per minute. The distance was not small, though; it was another half hour before Santini reported.

"Owl-A is slowing down. A little more, and I will suspend it."

This SAD's role was to be a relay. Its companion Owl-B shot away on the same course, vanishing behind the planetary disk, but the image on the viewscreen continued to be stable. Two small moons and one larger one passed by several minutes apart, shapeless fragments, pockmarked by micrometeorite strikes; then there was a series of some elongated bubbles, rising out of the depths of the planet's atmosphere and gleaming in the sun, and, finally, the dark spot looming ahead started to grow, turning into a rough likeness of a triangular pyramid with chipped vertices. The Owl slowed down fast, the image on the screen started to shake, but this lasted less than a second; then the picture settled and cleared up.

"Obscurus, Captain," Bo Santini's voice sounded. "Forty-seven kilometers to the surface."

Tumanov snorted happily.

"We'll be able to spot a fly at this distance!"

"But first, let's get a long shot," Praagh said. "The probe is recording. Bo, get a shot of the whole thing from three or four angles, we'll build a hologram."

"Yes, ma'am. Glad to be of service, ma'am. Anything for your burning eyes and red lips." Bo, AKA Boniface Antonio Sergio Héctor Santini, was a humorist and a joker, but also an amazing pilot. Everything that could swim, drive, dive, or fly, obeyed him with special eagerness; perhaps it was because the six implants in Bo's body made him partly related to any machine with nozzles, propellers, or wheels.

The SAD started to move, choosing a better vantage point, and it seemed that the lump of Obscurus was rotating, as if wishing to demonstrate all its mysteries and secrets. The mountain ridge that was the tetrahedron's edge, slid smoothly off the screen, revealing a dark, gloomy surface, cut up by shadows and cracks, which snaked like black lace on the background of umber and ash. But black-gray-brown turned out to be not the only shade of this plain: at its very center, there was a dimly-glowing blue oval dome, and, in its depth, under the ephemeral shield, there were bright lights. The three identical circles delineated by them were visible clearly and distinctly.

"Landing pads?" Tumanov mused. "What do you think Yegor?"

"No, more likely…"

It was suddenly quiet on the bridge. Corcoran noticed his XO freeze, her mouth agape.

"Command, Selina. What's going on with the long shot? Is it done?"

Praagh jerked.

"Yes, Captain. Bo, show it to us closer now. Not vertically, but at a forty-fifty degree angle. I think there is a cavity… there, behind those lights…"

The image shifted and magnified. A blue haze flooded the screen, but it didn't hinder the view, just the opposite: its soft, even glow and the light revealed an enormous chasm, a shaft, or a natural elliptical cavern and the three cylindrical shapes in it. The lights were located on their ends, and smooth gleaming surfaces went down, gripped somewhere in the chasm's depths by a system of giant rings, connected to one another and to the walls of the shaft by beams, cables, and walkways. There, among these lattice and tubular structures, something was moving, crawling back and forth, appearing and disappearing in circular openings dotting the walls; there, flaming tongues glowed in rhythmical flares, fountains of orange sparks rained down, translucent outgrowths stretched, sometimes thin and long, and sometimes bulging with a foamy white mass. In all this bustle, chaotic and disorderly at first glance, there was still some kind of meaning and goal, as if in a strange disharmonic symphony, which, despite the wailing of the tubas and the rumbling of the tympani, progressed according to its creator's plan.

"This dome…" Praagh uttered. "A force field? A screen holding in the air?"

"Without a doubt," Tumanov agreed. It's holding the atmosphere and protects from meteorites. We are familiar with this Faata technology, it's already being used in Martian cities. To cover a settlement with such a screen, they need–"

"Not a settlement," Siebel's quiet voice came from behind. "Not a settlement, Nikolay, it's a shipyard. Or a dry dock, if you will. An enormous dry dock, where three starships are being put together. Like the one that came to us."

"By the Lord of Emptiness!.." Seriy muttered and squirmed in his chair, turning to look back at Corcoran. "Three of these things will smash us into dust and ash! Everything, from Pluto to Mercury! We should get closer, Captain, before they're finished, and hit them with all guns at full power!"

"The Commodore will make that decision. We are only here to observe."

Corcoran leaned towards the monitor, peering into the depth of the monstrous abyss under the force dome. He had been to orbital shipyards, both those near Earth and those that had been built on Ceres and Pallas within the last few decades, but the sight here was impressive. He realized that he was looking only at the tip of the iceberg: Obscurus was, mostly likely, full of passages and caves, and its bowels probably hid giant industrial facilities. Obviously, they were processing the raw materials retrieved from the planetary atmosphere and its moons into millions of tons of metal, ceramics, plastics, everything that was required for the outer hull, the bulkheads and decks, the acceleration shafts and gravity drives, thousands of battle modules, delicate and complicated equipment, mechanisms, weapons, field generators… And, of course, all this industry needed to be controlled, the efforts of the workers of all production units coordinated.

"Dupressis," Corcoran called, "what do you hear, Dupressis?"

"Silence, sir. Nothing that looks like coded signals. The ship is in the area of radio silence, but the Owl's antennae are pointing straight at the object. If they were talking, I would have caught the transmission."

"Do you see anything like a radar beam?"

"No, sir. No means of detection. They don't appear to be monitoring space."

"I see. Continue the search."

Meanwhile, Selina was giving instructions to Bo, and, as a result, the image on the screen started to grow; Santini was squeezing everything out of the SAD's sensitive optics. Now, Corcoran could see mechanisms looking like a starfish with many flexible outgrowths crawling among the interwoven cables and beams. They were very large; a tiny humanoid head was sticking out from the translucent center of each of them, no larger than a buckwheat grain on a platter. The bodies of the operators were barely visible through the vehicle substance and appeared to be motionless, but the machines themselves were working hard. Their flexible tentacles were constantly in motion, stretching out and contracting, reaching for some parts or nodes, putting them into place, then spraying them with foam or a viscous white liquid, dousing it in flaming fireworks. _Assembly units,_ Corcoran thought. There were as many of them as there were termites in a mound: thousands, tens of thousands, but he focused on the figures of the workers. The first living Faata he had ever seen, not counting Yo, of course… But Yo was beautiful, and these guys did not look attractive. He was unable to make out their faces even at maximum magnification, but it seemed to him that their heads were hairless and strangely deformed: not a dome holding a mind, but something flattened.

"Look, look!" Tumanov suddenly cried out excitedly. "Transports! Maybe containers with raw materials… But how are they controlling them? Camille, do you hear anything?"

"No, sir," Dupressis replied guiltily.

The elongated bubbles they had seen earlier appeared above the mountain ridge, surrounding the plain. There was no longer any doubt about their artificial origin, nor the fact that they were similar in appearance to the Faata battle modules, but larger and not as angular. Each of the machines made a graceful curve above the dark peaks of the mountains and disappeared at the edge of the defense field, seemingly sinking into the ground. There was obviously an airlock there, but it seemed as if the very surface of Obscurus was swiftly and greedily swallowing the transport ships along with their cargo. They stretched in an endless line; a minute, five minutes, ten, fifteen, as if space itself was shooting them out from some inexhaustible warehouse.

Their stream ended on the seventeenth minute.

"How many of them are there?" Tumanov whispered in confusion. "A thousand? More?"

"Praagh, give me an exact number," Corcoran demanded.

"Eight hundred and thirty-two, sir." Her voice cracked. "The fleets of all the terrestrial companies put together consist of more transport vessels, but these are so huge! At least half a kilometer, according to preliminary estimates."

Corcoran nodded, figuring that any surprises were possible here, which meant that it would be prudent to continue observing the shipyard. The value of these observations grew with the increase in duration and detail, and, if the Faata did not monitor the surrounding space, he could hover near the rock covering them for a whole week. Then he thought that there were all sorts of surprises, including the lethal kind, and it would be a good idea to add some insurance against them, especially since they had half-a-dozen data probes aboard, and there was no reason to spare them.

"Cancel the Green Alert," he spoke, opening up his cocoon. "All those not on watch can rest. Bo, set the Owls to automatic. Selina, what is the state of the data probe? Is it loaded?"

"Yes, Captain."

"Add commentary to the video recordings and include a message that we're going to be here for two days. Send the first probe, and we'll send the second one in forty-eight hours with the results of follow-up observations."

"We could send everything in one package," Selina said. "In two days, I mean."

"No. The information must not be lost, and Lord of Emptiness only knows what will happen to us in two days," Corcoran said and left the bridge.

Nothing had changed in Siebel's quarters, only the cap with the octopus-like trinket was covered by an opaque plastic bag. Despite this, it drew Corcoran in like a magnet; he had to make an effort to pull his eyes away and not reach for the strange thing with his hands. Its vague shape, a bunch of colored spots, barely visible under the cap's matte surface, was firmly entrenched in his subconscious.

"The shipyard," Klaus said, "the shipyard and these ships under construction… Have you seen anything like it in your Dreams?"

Corcoran shook his head.

"Definitely not. You're familiar with my Dreams, I tell them to you… I have not yet seen images like that." He furrowed his brow and stared at the floor, to avoid looking at the black plastic bag. "It doesn't look like there have been astronauts among my Faata ancestors."

"There must have been. Our service believes that you come from a Bino Faata, a member of the upper caste, rather than a lowly t'ho worker. They're all descendants of the star wanderers who had returned home during the Second Eclipse… Then again, it's one thing to fly on a ship and another to build it. I don't think there are many fully sentient beings on this shipyard; two-three tops, and all of them are Keepers of Communications.

"Keepers of Communications?" Corcoran frowned. "You mean specialists in the psychic contact with a quasi-mind? Those who maintain its psychological stability? Not engineers, not designers, not technologists? That's unlikely, Klaus. There are tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of workers, complex mechanisms, a transportation network, and powerful, and therefore dangerous, weapons… Who is in charge of the construction then? And how does that happen, by the way? We haven't detected any radio signals, and this giant complex requires control."

The floor shuddered under him; Selina had probably launched the data probe. This machine was larger than a SAD; a two-meter long cylinder with a contour drive, capable of throwing it to the edge of the universe, but only once: transitions to Limbo and back with such a small acceleration shaft destroyed the drive. It didn't look like the Faata had solved this problem, as their battle modules with gravity propulsion were not meant for interstellar flights.

"Captain, the probe has been launched," Praagh's voice came from the intercom.

"Thank you." Corcoran estimated that their report would be in the _Europe_'s computer in several milliseconds, and raised his eyes at Siebel once again.

Siebel was smiling, and that smile made him look younger. _Or did he really decide to make himself younger for Selina?.._ Corcoran thought.

"You want to know who's in charge of the construction? A Daskin creature, what else! It's on one of the ships, and it doesn't need engineers, only t'ho effectors of the workers caste. It communicates telepathically with them, as for the Keepers… The Keepers are there only as a precaution, for monitoring."

A shiver ran down Corcoran's spine. He suddenly recalled the stories told by Mother and Uncle Pavel, and he could almost see the cramped pentagonal chamber in the depths of an alien ship, at the center of which was a slowly pulsing brown mass. Then a silent explosion, shaking the air, and a man's figure appeared out of nowhere, tall and thin, with disheveled blond hair. Gunther Voss, as Pavel Litvin had remembered him… Voss, and at his feet was the heavy, quietly humming container of the sigga… Voss, the Exile, a Protector, the being sitting right next to him, a Metamorph wearing the mask of Klaus Siebel!

The realization of this incredible situation momentarily pierced Corcoran. He leaned towards Siebel and spoke slowly.

"So, here, on one of the ships, is a quasi-sentient… The same sort of beast you and Litvin killed… And you could teleport me to it?"

"No. You should've been paying more attention to my story; I can teleport you twenty-thirty thousand kilometers, but it's over a million to Obscurus."

"All right… I understand, the distance is too great… But what if we close to the shipyard to within the diameter of Earth? How about then?"

"Then, no problem." Siebel grinned. "But why? Do you want to destroy this creature or subjugate it? But I have neither a sigga nor a psychic amplifier! And you, my friend, have no need to play hero. It's not the year of the Invasion, and your cruisers are not helpless eggshells. It's been over a third of a century, and you have different ships, different weapons, colonies at all the nearby stars… You are a galactic race!"

"What about it?" Corcoran asked, looking at his friend with great suspicion.

"I'm still making a point that there is no need for heroics from you; Commodore Vrba can deal with the shipyard without our help. Trust me on this! A shipyard is not a planet; it's a localized and very vulnerable object. A sudden strike at the moon, and this entire rock will be vaporized along with the unfinished ships, thousands of t'ho, and the Daskin beastie. You understand that, right?"

"Naturally." Corcoran started to cool down. _Klaus is right,_ he thought, _yesterday's feat need not be repeated._ He made several deep breaths and spoke. "Let's get back to our situation. You're insisting that there is a quasi-sentient on one of the ships. Is that an assumption or an exact knowledge?"

"You can check for yourself."

"How?"

"Psychic probing. You can do it."

"No, I can't," Corcoran said angrily. "I receive emotions and thought only from people nearby, not at cosmic distances. Besides, we're on the other side of the planet, and it blocks telepathic fields."

Siebel looked at him with a slight sneer, the way a wise mentor, who had lived for millennia, looked at his young pupil.

"What do you know of telepathic fields? Of course, their intensity decreases with distance, but gravitating masses are not barriers for them. And what do you know about yourself? You're changing, Paul, your powers are growing, and you need to get used to that. Today, you can do a little more than yesterday, tomorrow, you'll be able to do more than today… Try it! Take a step in a direction you haven't gone before. You can! You can!"

Leaning against the bulkhead, Corcoran closed his eyes and touched the minds of his crew. It was a familiar sensation, like looking at bright flames nearby, almost next to him, he could feel their warmth and hear the crackling of the firewood. Beyond this circle of the familiar and strong connection was darkness, which he was used to considering a psychics barrier or something limiting his capabilities; occasionally, he would try to pierce the dark space, but the attempts always ended in failure; the thought got bogged down in it like a fly in hardening amber. He understood that the darkness was an illusion, that there were other mind flames burning somewhere in it, but reaching them seemed a daunting task. However… Take a step in a direction you haven't gone before. You can! You can!

He got a feeling that out there, in the cosmic distance, was something gigantic, like a web of thin intersecting lines, dark and, at the same time, different from the surrounding darkness. Corcoran reached towards this mind with all his strength, and the nodes of the web suddenly flared, but not with a bright, clean flame, but like crimson ash-covered embers. Thousands of images spun around in his head: he seemed to be piloting a space transport through the atmosphere of an enormous planet, filling the reservoirs with its gases, cutting through the unyielding mountains of an asteroid, grinding the rock into dust, commanding semi-sentient machines, a strange symbiosis of human beings and organosilicon pseudoflesh, looking through a countless number of eyes at a myriad of other devices and assemblies, just as strange, connecting people with artificial muscles, laser beams, sensors, regenerators producing food and air, growing embryos, which were making the structure more complicated and turning into something similar to familiar devices. By some strange means, he realized that the being on the other side of the darkness hadn't noticed him: either because it was too busy or for some other unexplained reason. It seemed that, despite its enormity and power, it was incapable of penetrating the dark barriers separating it from the human frigate and her crew.

Exhaling sharply, Corcoran broke contact and opened his eyes. Siebel's face loomed as a white spot, his eyesight returning slowly, and, for the next several seconds, the walls of the cabin, the cot, and the desk with holoprojectors and books swayed like on an ancient sailboat caught in a storm. This dance soon stopped, and the world of the ship, familiar and stable, closed in around Corcoran.

Siebel reached out and gripped his wrist, either calming him down or getting his pulse.

"It's difficult at first, but it will get easier each time… easier and easier, and you will learn to quench the psychic resonance… but for now, think of something nice… think of Vera and the girls, imagine your garden in the Holmy, the blossoming cherries and plums, the rose bush by the porch… this is reality, Paul, your reality… come back, enter it…"

"That's also reality." Corcoran nodded towards the hatch, as if the dark rock of Obscurus floated in the darkness and the cold behind it. "I'm okay, Klaus. This… this was educational. I had no idea I was capable of that!"

"You are," Siebel said. He said it firmly, as if hammering a nail into a board. Then he inquired, "Well, did you hear it? What are your impressions?"

"That thing is diabolical! Are you sure that there's only one… only one creature there?"

"Yes. One is enough for now, but, when the ships are ready, there will be one beast like that in each of them. We… I mean, my people… we have rarely encountered them, but we know that the Faata grow them. Here, in the New Worlds, there is also a nursery, on Ro'on or T'har. Probably on Ro'on, these creatures like warmth and require water. A lot of water."

"A nursery…" Corcoran mused. "Yo was from T'har, and she never told me about that… You must be right, the nursery is on Ro'on. I think the first thing I need to do is find it."

"The first thing _we_ need to do," Siebel responded, emphasizing the pronoun. "We! Do you really think I'm going to stay here and not go with you? That I would let you go alone? What would I tell your mother if you did not come back? What about your wife and daughters?" His face suddenly started to change, his hair and eyes grew dark, his chin and cheekbones narrowed, his skull elongated, and his skin became milky white. "Faata m'regi?" he spoke with a question mark and attempted to form a smile with his tiny mouth. "Am I not a Faata? And are we not a beautiful pair? A ruler and his faithful genie, ready to take his master to the end of the world, if danger presents itself…"

Corcoran, looking at this metamorphosis with surprise and delight, brightened.

"Are you offering yourself as transportation? Really, I didn't think… A living teleporter! What could be more reliable! We can take a combat robot with us. You carry us, and we protect you."

"That's not necessary. I'm not helpless."

"But you don't have a sigga! And no psychic amplifier either! Or did you keep something over the centuries?"

"Maybe I did," Siebel said with dignity, restoring his usual appearance. "I also could've acquired something new. Progress does continue, Paul, on Earth and on other worlds, and its results can be so amazing…"

He looked at the small object, covered by dark plastic, and chuckled.


	7. Chapter 6

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (Ответныйудар) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Chapter 6**

**Dyte, Keeper of Communications**

He always experienced a burst of energy after the t'hami oblivion. It was no wonder, for he was already at the age of maturity, as he had first seen light not in the New Worlds but on the other side of the Void, on Eindo'o, one of the colonies settled back at the beginning of the Third Phase. He was not as old as Waira or Foyn, but still, his flesh was already feeling the pressing weight of time, and the rejuvenating treatments, which also removed the tension of the tuahha, were far from unnecessary.

After leaving the t'hami chamber, he spent a long time standing in the middle of his underground dwelling, studying his holographic image, woven from strands of light. The signs of old age were not yet visible: there was no green in his dark shining hair, his skin was smooth, without a trace of wrinkles, his lips were firm, his figure was thin and slender, like that of all the higher caste Faata. In human time measurements, he had lived for three hundred and twenty years and could still last at least as long, especially on the pleasant, warm Ro'on. Ro'on was the best of the New Worlds, a true gem, found among the stars by Waira's Ship, the first and, for now, the only one to cross the Void. The Ship continued on with Yata, a different Pillar of Order, for Ships needed to fly, expanding the reach of the race, and Waira, by the right of the eldest, had taken Ro'on's best continent. Now Waira's Sheaf ruled this landmass, and no one had left it, except for Intermediary Iveh; not Yan, the Guardian of the Heavens, not the Watchers Tuyma and Uyggi. He, Dyte, the Keeper of Communications, had also stayed behind, sending his seed and his offspring along with Yata and Iveh. Let them fly! And may they never see an Eclipse!

Dyte himself did not feel the pull to change locations, even less so for distant travels. His homeworld Eindo'o was a cold and scarce place, poor in life and natural resources; its inhabitants' primary concern was enriching the atmosphere with oxygen and drilling wells, necessary to reach the underground waters. They only grew small brains, a bit dumb, capable of regulating the water balance or controlling a few thousand t'ho, working at the atmospheric factory. Eindo'o would be unable to equip its own Ship, as it required a higher-order quasi-mind, which needed warmth and plenty of mineral-rich water during its maturation process. For Dyte, whose psychic gift had manifested early and with incredible strength, his home planet was a dead end. Dyte was, quite possibly, the best Keeper of the Third Phase, and was, most likely, one of the best of the current era; what would someone like that have to do on an arid and poor world, even if it was his homeworld? Which was why he had agreed to Waira's offer, when the Ship made a stop at Eindo'o on its way to the Void, and the Pillar of Order started to gather additional crew. This was done in accordance with ancient tradition: a Ship leaving on a long voyage was required to take t'ho and the fully sentient Faata from multiple planets, so that the new settlers were not at risk from a diminished gene pool. Besides, this allowed the sperm bank to be refilled, which served to inseminate the ksa breeders.

After Eindo'o, Ro'on seemed to be a happy abode: three large continents, plains covered in grass and moss, an unending source of fiber, the lack of dangerous fauna, an ecological cycle familiar to the plants that had been cultivated since ancient times, a generous sun, a salty ocean, and plenty of fresh water. There was another planet in Ro'on's system, T'har, suitable for colonization, and Aezat at a neighboring star was also not the worst world the Faata had had to settle. There was also a gas giant here with a retinue of moons, sources of raw materials for Ships that were built anywhere the circumstances allowed. Really, the only valuable resource that could not be found here were sentient creatures, capable of serving and working, which was why Iveh, Intermediary, Speaker with the Bino Tegari, meaning aliens, had not stayed on Ro'on, leaving with Yata on a new flight. He had no one to speak to here.

The Ship had left with the maturation of the first generation of t'ho, who had replaced the pilots, olks, ksa, and the worker castes who had died. In principle, each newly-colonized world had to send its Mothership on the next journey, as well as equip another one, so that the expansion would not stop, and that the other races, the Dromi and the P'ata, the Haptors and the Llyano, the Kni'lina and the Shada, felt dread before the might of the Third Phase. A Ship took a long time to build and required a lot of effort, but Waira, Foyn, and Yass, the Pillars of Order of the three continents, had laid down an entire flotilla, for the beachhead of this branch of the galaxy necessitated rapid expansion. What dangers lurked here? Which races called this place home? No one knew that. The Daskins had marked the nearby sector as lacking sentience, but it was foolish to trust this ancient chart, for it had been put together at the time when the furry ancestors of the Faata still had their tails. Over the millions of years, warlike races, like those very same Dromi or Haptors, could have moved into the region.

"A fleet of three Ships, a lot of work, much, much effort…" Dyte mused, peering into his image in the middle of the gloomy hall. Three whole Ships! He turned off the projector with a thought and started to put on his clothing. The quasi-mind for one of them had already been grown and sent to the outer planet with a pair of his own offsprin, not as gifted as Tiych, the firstborn of his seed, who had left with Yata, but they were already capable of maintaining the stability of the giant brain. Two others were maturing in the warm waters of M'ar'nehadi, and even here, a third of the planetary diameter away, he could feel their sleepy contentment. Not yet sentient, but already more than a mindless mass of neuron cells and organosilicon tissues… Their individuality would soon awaken. Probably before his hair turned green and his skin was furrowed by wrinkles.

Dyte stepped towards the gravity shaft, leading to the surface, and unlocked the entrance membrane. He had but to step over the threshold and rise up to the light and the sun on a stream of warm air, soar towards the green grass and the trees, return to the world that, after the many cycles he had spent in oblivion, had taken a small step forward. He touched the membrane, peered into its iridescence, and suddenly froze, trying to resurrect something important in his mind. Some thought or matter he'd forgotten in t'hami? Unlikely: the trance, interrupted by the awakening equipment at the necessary moment, did not hinder the work of the brain. A problem in his dwelling? Also doubtful: his defenses were perfect and did not register any alarm signals. Something with his appearance? Some feature, a detail he missed?..

Activating the projector, Dyte once again examined his holographic double, this time wearing skin-tight bright-green clothing. Nothing! Stretching his lips, which was a sign of irritation, he summoned a flying module and headed towards the gravlift with a determined look. Whatever had slipped away would not disappear, it would be remembered at the moment of contact with the quasi-mind, at the instant of crystal, piercing clarity, granting power over the past and the future. A power greater than that possessed by all the Pillars of Order on Ro'on, the rulers of the present.

Above, in the transparent violet sky, the enormous disk of the sun hovered above the horizon, spilling the orange glow over the blue-green plain. It slipped through the bumpy tree trunks and slowly rolled down the hill ridge to the river, glittering emerald sparkles in the morning light. Htaa trees stood in an uneven circle at the top of the hill, surrounding their giant progenitor, from whose seeds, spread by the wind during the fruit-bearing seasons, had born both this grove and all the others nearby, crowning the hills with flat green caps. Sharp roofs of structures, where the local t'ho worked and lived, gleamed white on the riverbank. They were supervised by Overseer Haiza, a failed Keeper of Communications, who was, nevertheless, capable of communicating with the small regional brain. The brain controlled the t'ho and the machines extracting nutrients from the moss, the foliage, and the grass, but this was an incidental and not its primary function for the higher-caste Faata living in the hills. The psychic field maintained by the quasi-mind in the area was more important; it allowed them to communicate and give orders telepathically, without the use of a kaff or a contact film.

Four olk guards with dense musculature were lying on the grass under the htaa trees, where the hill started descending to the plain. Their smooth skin and hairless scalps glistened in the sun, the amplifier bracelets gripped their powerful forearms, their cheeked faces seemed calm. However, Dyte knew how deceptive their serenity was; olks were always ready for action, and nothing but death or a new order could stop them.

The olks here maintained his peace (occasionally, some workers, not connected to the quasi-mind, would run up from the riverbank to the hills), but he did not feel any sympathy for the guards, nor any other t'ho. No sympathy, no dislike, no compassion, only indifference and slight disgust. The t'ho were, of course, a necessary part of civilization, its consumable goods, which were quickly worn out and just as quickly restored, but they were not true sentient beings. Millennia of breeding had turned them into appendages of the machines or mindless executors but ensured stability: the Third Phase did not experience confrontations of opinions, widespread discontent, rebellions, or wars, which had led to the fall of the previous cultures.

_Things were difference once, but those times have passed,_ Dyte thought, throwing an indifferent glance at the guards. He was still feeling irritated; the thought of something that had happened but been forgotten continued to torment him.

The flying module awaited him on the hillside facing the river. The floor of the cabin bulged, forming a seat, the walls were rippled by a haze and then turned transparent, and, through one of them, Dyte made out a long row of grass-filled platforms, slowly gliding towards the buildings on the riverbank. He had never been there and had never spoken with Haiza, the local Overseer. Their ranks were incompatible: Haiza commanded a few hundred t'ho workers, while Dyte, a member of the Sheaf, was one of the planetary rulers.

The module silently rose and turned south, towards the narrow M'ar'nehadi Sea separating the two continents. A thin naked pilot, wrapped in contact film, was hanging in the forward part of the cabin, and, linking with him for a moment, Dyte ordered, "Higher!.. Higher and faster!" The blue-green plain rapidly disappeared behind them, then the movement of the grass, the trees, and the hills appeared to slow down; the machine soared up into the violet sky, the horizon unfolded, the trees and the grass melded into monochromatic rug with silver strands of rivers and wrinkled elevations. Dyte once again touched the pilot's mind. The t'ho was happy: the rapid flight and the fusion with the vehicle filled him with a happy feeling of freedom. Only flight, mere flight… He was a part of the peaceful transportation caste and did not know how to use weapons or kill. Combat pilots were different; their happiness was fueled by destruction. The death of the hated aliens, the destruction of ships, the flame consuming cities… Life was a fiery flare, replacing the trance of t'hami, where they normally spent their time.

Below, rounding the plain, rose a mountain ridge, wrapped in clouds. The mountains were small and picturesque: waterfalls ran down the slopes into the gorges, blue lakes shone in the extinguished craters, lilac, yellow, white rocks became meadows and plateaus, there were occasional spots of the forests, Ro'on's endemic flora, not yet displaced by the alien plants. The Faata liked this area, which held the memory of their homeworld; not that charred, bare planet it had become after the Second Eclipse, but flowering, fertile, untouched by civilization. _This is how things used to be, but those times have passed and will never return,_ Dyte thought again, peering into the play of colors. They descended below the clouds and passed the waterfalls, hiding the steeply cut hillside; here, under the protection of the stone arches and force fields, was the center of the Sheaf, and with them, in the depth of the rocky mountain, was the coordinating brain and the shaft with battle modules. The climate in this place was hot and humid, rains were frequent, and the water, draining from the overflowing lakes onto the coastal plain, bore rivers. The plain, narrow and stretching from east to west, bordered the sea, and, beyond its tranquil water, rose the southern landmass, which belonged to Yass's Sheaf, the smallest on Ro'on. Yass was young and ambitious; he would probably leave on the first Ship in search of a world where he could become an absolute ruler.

The flying module was descending. A p'hot preserve, surrounded by a shield barrier, passed, then a tall stone terrace with twin blue domes came forward; their distant end went into the sea, where water raged at the gateways.

A psychic probe touched his mind. Noyakh, Foyn's Keeper of Communications… The touch was cautious, submissive even; Noyakh was aware of his strength. Aboard the Ship, which had crossed the dark Void, he was one of Dyte's assistants and was not distinguished by any special talents. Tiych, who had flown away with Yata, promised to be much more.

"The regimen is stable," Noyakh transmitted respectfully, accompanying the thought with a visual image: two large saltwater pools with lumpy brown carcasses on the bottom. Based on their slow pulses, Dyte understood that no incidents had occurred during his trance. More than likely, Noyakh had not entered into contact with the quasi-sentients, afraid to take the risk: they were very sensitive at the maturation stage.

"Leave. I no longer need you."

They broke contact. In Noyakh's emotional spectrum, he felt carefully hidden uncertainty and fear; he had never grown a large quasi-mind before. A truly large brain, one capable of controlling a giant Ship and thousands of t'ho. The gift of a Keeper of Communications was rare, and there had not been any new talents or prospective genetic lines on Ro'on, T'har, or Aezat. No one but Tiych and two of Dyte's other offspring. That was not many, but not so few either, if one considered the low fertility of the ksa and the laws of heredity, limiting the transfer of psychic abilities.

The module landed, and Dyte stepped out, putting the pilot into a waiting trance. Standing on the terrace, he looked over at the forest stretching out at its foot, listened to the distant roar of the p'hots, and took several deep breaths. His eyes closed; sunlight was replaced by semidarkness, the howling of the beasts, the sound of the waves, the rustling of the leaves started to move away, flow from his mind, until it was covered by a deep echoing silence. Lowing his mental barrier, which protected his mind, Dyte stretched to the brain, sleeping at the bottom of the pool, then threw a telepathic line to the other one, awakening them to activity. They responded, feeding him with energy, melding in telepathic union; the darkness disappeared, the world started to rapidly expand, first including all of Ro'on, then the cold T'har, the two infertile worlds spinning beyond T'har, and, finally, Meytani, the outer planet, where Ships were being assembled on one of its moons. That was the initial stage of the contact: establishing a link to the third brain, a mature one, capable of intelligent communication. That faraway quasi-mind could teach its younger brethren far quicker and more successfully than a Faata, even someone with a Keeper's experience. If the mental link was maintained, then…

Dyte started, opening his eyes, and the line stretching out into space was cut. He stood motionless for some time, looking over the memories coming back to him, evaluating and weighing them; had he been a human of Earth, the sensations he felt would have been a mix of surprise and disbelief. But, unlike humans, Dyte and his fellow Faata did not perceive strange facts as something irrational, unexplainable, or, perhaps, as a figment of imagination; they assumed that their senses did not trick them, and that even an unexplained fact was still useful. Therefore, Dyte did not doubt the reality of what had happened but pondered the meaning and the consequences of the events.

Having clarified them as much as his scant information allowed, he touched the mind of Waira, the Pillar of Order, and asked for an audience.

Waira was old. His long hair was green, deep wrinkles framed his eyes, his lips drooped, making them look like a beak, his body was dried up, and the form-fitting clothes only emphasized the fragility and ephemerality of his flesh. He was at an age when radiation therapy, conducted during the tuahha period, sustained life but not the appearance, for each method had a limit; then again, he could still live and rule for a long time, for the Faata did not know senility or any other ailments. It was said that Waira was one of those space travelers who had returned to the homeworld at the age of the Second Eclipse, and even if that was not true, then he would have had to have experienced the start of the Third Phase. Only Iveh seemed as ancient, but he had left Ro'on long ago, and there were now no more contemporaries of Waira left in the New Worlds.

He floated in the weightlessness zone, near the sphere representing the planet. The enormous hall, whose ceiling was too high up to be visible, opened to the south, to the coastal plain, the wide arches; a force field glittered beyond them, and a stream of water endlessly fell from the mountains. The sphere, hanging in the center, symbolized power, power over a Ship or a planet, and, by ancient tradition, a Pillar of Order's assistants were called Those Who Stand by the Sphere.

But Waira was alone now. He lowered to the ribbed disk under the sphere, hiding the gravity generator, and moved his thin, fragile fingers, allowing Dyte to come closer.

"You wanted to speak with me. I am listening." His surprisingly strong, resonant voice echoed under the hall's ceiling.

"I just had my tuahha period," Dyte spoke, sending a mental picture, his naked crouched figure, hanging in a gloomy chamber, wrapped in tubes and strips of contact film. "I have spent seven cycles in t'hami."

"You just had your tuahha, and you have spent seven cycles in t'hami," Waira repeated deliberately. "Do you think anyone cares? I don't."

Faata grew irritable with age, Dyte noted, not letting this thought out. His mental block was flawless.

"The t'hami trance is deep and shuts off the mind," he said. "But I still received information. A signal. Probably on a subconscious level."

In a similar situation, a human would say that he'd had a dream. But the Faata of the Third Phase, both t'ho and the fully sentient, did not require sleep. Their physiological cycle was different: long sleepless periods were alternated by short periods of tuahha, a time of elevated emotional activity, due to an excess of sex hormones. In the ancient times, the tuahha stimulated reproduction using the same manner that was employed by humans, the Kni'lina, and the other humanoid races, but it was considered absurd and barbaric in this age. The Faata had been practicing artificial insemination for over a thousand years, procreation was being done through the ksa caste, and all the other females were barren. However, they had been unable to eliminate the periodic hormone release, which was embedded too deeply in the race's genetics and heredity mechanism, so the ancient instinct was being suppressed by a total oblivion in t'hami. In this state of unconsciousness, vital processes were slowed down much more than during sleep, the need for air and food, as well as the sexual tension, were almost nonexistent. And, of course, no one ever saw dreams in t'hami. They did not even have such a concept.

Waira stretched his drooping lips. This indicated a grimace of distrust rather than a smile; the Faata had a different set of facial expressions than humans.

"The t'hami trance is indeed a deep one," he agreed. "If you have received some sort of information, it will remain there, beyond the barrier of consciousness. You cannot comprehend it with your mind."

"You forget that I am a Keeper and that my gift is stronger than Noyakh's or that of anyone living in the New Worlds. Stronger than yours, Pillar of Order, even though you are the most experienced and wisest of us." Dyte bent his arms in the gesture of submission. "Having come out of t'hami, I have established a link with the quasi-mind, and that helped me to remember and comprehend. If the link is strong, the barriers fall… You understand what I mean."

He transmitted the sensation of the mental flight in the emptiness and the clarity, as cold, endless, as the interstellar space that lay beyond the tiny world of Ro'on. Waira's eyes flashed. The Pillar of Order knew this feeling, like all the Faata capable of telepathic exchange. A thousandth of their race, the intellect of civilization, for hundreds of millions of t'ho were mere stones of its pedestal.

"So, you have received a message, Keeper… Where did the signals come from? From Aezat or through the Void?"

"Through the Void? I don't think so. Even Aezat is too distant and inaccessible for psychic communication, until they get five or six large quasi-sentients."

"Perhaps Aezat has built a Ship, which is now approaching us," Waira countered. "Or a Ship is performing a series of jumps from the direction of the Void, and that is why…" He pressed his lips in thought. "No, this is unlikely. Not much time has passed since we have crossed the Void. It is too soon to send a second Ship. The Old Worlds will await news from us, they will wait for the Ship we are building… Then it must be Aezat?"

"I doubt it, Pillar of Order. Aezat is too poor, and, even though they are equipping a single Ship, not three like us, we will finish first. I am certain of that."

"Then where did the signals you've received came from? And why did you perceive them in t'hami? Did you attempt to establish contact again?"

"Yes, but without success. We know little about subconscious psychic communication, but I think…" Dyte was unsure, "I think that it was Yata's Ship. More specifically, one the small battle modules that was likely sent by him to Ro'on or T'har from the periphery of the system. I think, Yata is returning."

The skin under Waira's eyes sagged, and Dyte was once again amazed how old he was. Perhaps, he was older than Iveh and all those who had seen the beginning of the Third Phase.

"Yata is returning?" the Pillar of Order spoke. "Why? It is not only too soon but impossible! To find and settle a new planet, grow a new generation of t'ho, build a new Ship… This takes time!"

They were not discussing the nature of the signals received by Dyte, but their probable source, which was more important. Psychic waves scattered over large distances, the received signals were vague, their meaning distorted beyond recognition, and, besides, the message could turn out to be a spontaneous psychic emission, not realized by the sender, not containing anything he would wish to say. The sender was, of course, a Faata; Dyte would be unable to recognize an alien psychic pulse. The galaxy's inhabitants had different brain structures, and the Third Phase has yet to encounter beings with whom they would be able to establish a direct telepathic contact.

Waira waited. The silence stretched. The waterfall silently streamed beyond the threshold of the force shield, the solar disk looked like an orange blot through the watery veil, and clouds piled up above the mountains. Warm rains watered the plateaus, the air there was hot and humid, but it was easy to breathe in the enormous underground cavity. The quiet and the cool here calmed Dyte.

"Yata could have experienced difficulties," he said finally. "We don't know what he encountered. A Dromi or Haptor battle fleet, mercenaries of the Lo'ona Aeo, a Silmarri caravan, P'ata or Shada orbital bases… But I am certain of one thing: the signal came from my offspring. From a powerful Keeper of Communications, whose pulses have crossed a great distance and were received by a related brain." He touched his forehead with his palm, paused, and continued. "My offspring on Meytani did not establish contact, that has been verified. Only Tiych remains. But Tiych has left with Yata and cannot appear here without a Ship. This means that Yata is returning."

Silence fell once again. Then Waira asked, "Are you certain about Tiych?"

"He is my offspring," Dyte repeated stubbornly. "Who else could I have heard? At a great distance, subconsciously, in the t'hami trance?.. Tiych, only Tiych! I am not mistaken about this, Pillar of Order, I am familiar with the spectrum of the emission and can recognize it accurately. Tiych manifested the same genetic traits as I did. A powerful Keeper! He will become even stronger with time."

"So what did you hear? Or saw?"

Dyte closed his eyes and focused, calling up the mental image.

"A module… a small battle module," he said quietly, sending the image of a cramped space. The gloom within the walls of the cabin, the contact film stretching from the floor to the ceiling, and the sensation of the surrounding emptiness, dark, cold, and endless… He could not say where the flying vehicle was heading, but it seemed obvious: to Ro'on or T'har. These modules were created for battle, in-system flights, or patrols, their range and resources were limited. That meant Ro'on or T'har… probably, Ro'on, if one remembered that the ruling Sheaf, Waira's Sheaf, was located here.

"A small module," Waira echoed. "Something else?"

"There were two in it."

"Obviously! Tiych wouldn't be flying it himself!" Irritation once again came through the Pillar of Order's voice, then was immediately replaced by concern. "The Ship is returning, and Yata has sent a module, as if he wants to tell us something… If he has encountered the Dromi or the Haptors… especially the Dromi… and if they are following our Ship…" Now Waira's psychic pulses showed genuine alarm rather than mere concern. "I will speak with Foyn and Yass, and you send a warning to T'har. We will send several modules with a coordinating brain, this will be done by Yan and two other Strategists… Can you determine the direction, Keeper?"

"The sector between the orbits of Ro'on and T'har, towards Meytani," Dyte said. "We should send scouts from Meytani as well. It has a large quasi-sentient and two of my offspring. Perhaps they will find the Ship and its pursuers."

A thought of unknown danger suddenly pierced him. Until now, life on Ro'on had been so pleasant and serene… Then again, the reason for the alarm seemed too uncertain; no matter what Waira had said, Yata could have returned for a thousand different reasons. For example, the chosen direction of the flight could lack promise, and the crew's bioresources were exhausted; it was possible for the ksa females to suddenly stop producing offspring or bear mutant bastards. In that case, the gene pool and the sperm bank would need to be replenished.

"It's a good idea about Meytani," Waira agreed. "Contact your offspring, have them take control over the peripheral space. But their main task is to preserve the Ships… Tell them that, Dyte!"

"I will not forget, Pillar of Order."

"Go. Let us never see the darkness of an Eclipse!"

Making the gesture of respect, Dyte headed for the gravity shaft and descended to the lower tier. Here, in the maze of the center of the Sheaf, in the interweaving of hallways, stairs, and ramps, cramped chambers and spacious halls, there was liveliness; perhaps, there was no other place on the planet, where five hundred fully sentient beings and eight to ten thousand t'ho worked together. For the most part, they performed embryonic surgery, selection and fertility enhancement of females, adaptation of warriors and workers to Ro'on's conditions, as well as the problem of psychic genetics. The latest was the most important area for the entire Faata civilization, especially for the New Worlds, its tiny shard, cast into another branch of the galaxy. The ksa were fertilized only by the sperm of the fully sentient, but the gift for thought contact was inherited only in one or two cases out of ten thousand and was showing a declining tendency. All attempts at creating a race of telepaths, so numerous, productive, and resilient that there would be no more need for t'ho, were as yet futile, and the progress of the Third Phase continued to be determined by the million individuals capable of communicating directly with the quasi-sentient symbiotes. Some specialists believes that the activation of the psychic genes was only a matter of time, while others claimed that it was necessary to achieve the inheritance of the required traits through both the patrilineal and the matrilineal lines, but there were also those who thought that everything was leading up to a new Eclipse. Most did not care for them. No one liked dark prophecies, which, however, did not stop them from coming true.

Dyte stepped out onto the artificial promenade hanging over the precipice. Loud waterfalls were to the right, the gorge below was veiled in fog, in the distance, beyond the coastal plain, was the gleaming surface of the M'ar'nehadi, and the enormous and warm disk of the sun was descending to the west, towards Foyn's continent. There were four rows of flying modules on the promenade, hundreds upon hundreds of machines with pilots frozen in a trance; they stretched like walls made of dark angular stones, placed on the even platform by the hand of a giant. Dyte sent a telepathic pulse, awakening the t'ho in his vehicle, unlocked the membrane, but did not continue moving; he froze, looking at the fog rising out of the chasm and remembering the vision that had come to him.

There was a module, a tiny ship, flying through space, and the dark abyss, full of stars, and two beings, whose mental spectrums he could sense through the emptiness, albeit vaguely, that separated them from Ro'on. One of them was an offspring of his seed, which meant it had to be Tiych; the other one was probably a pilot. But the film, the contact film, stretched from the floor to the ceiling of the cabin!.. Dyte tried to resurrect the memory, and it suddenly seemed to him that the film was empty, like the peel of a fruit without any pulp or juice. He was almost certain of that, and his certainty collided with accurate knowledge: ships didn't fly without pilots.

At least, ships of the Third Phase didn't.


	8. Chapter 7

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (Ответныйудар) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Chapter 7**

**Space near Ro'on and on the surface of Ro'on**

The touch of the film burned, and it seemed that his skin would start smoking now, covered in flames, and burn through to the bones along with the flesh. With his mind, Corcoran understood that it was an illusion, but his senses tricked him, trying to convince him that scalding needles were being inserted into his nerve clusters, and his neck and spine were being stroked by a blowtorch or a hot iron. The pain knocked tears out of his eyes, blurred Klaus's face and the devices crowding the cabin, made it difficult to keep track of the guidance system, and yet the red dot representing the module continued to get closer to the green marker of the calculated trajectory. All they had to do was join, Corcoran anticipated hopefully, and his torture would be over! Then, they would merely follow the laws of celestial mechanics, on an elliptical orbit, which would, at the proper moment, slip into Ro'on's atmosphere, and then... _Then pain will begin anew,_ he thought.

Despite the many similarities between the Faata and the people of Earth, there were, of course, differences, not very significant ones, if one meant the fully sentient and some of the higher-caste t'ho. But the pilots, those who controlled starships and those who flew in large and small modules, were a special category, very different from human standards. The examination of the bodies, found after the disaster in the Antarctic, had led to furious debates among Earth's scientists: some thought that the pilots were biorobots, while others assumed them to be natural organisms that had undergone radical genetic restructuring. Either way, no ordinary person, whether human or a Faata, could operate a flying module, becoming an annex of its equipment, like a living ANS, and, at the same time, the gunner and the psychic communication unit. Corcoran, who had undergone special training, was capable of withstanding half an hour, forty-fifty minutes at most, but that was his limit. Barely enough time to take the module onto the necessary course or land at some appropriate location.

He seemed like a rocket to himself, piercing the dense air layers. His skin/hull was red-hot, but the weapon, the drive, the regenerator, and the rest of the equipment hidden under its armor worked without fail: he felt the breathing gas enter the cabin, the powerful evenly vibrating gravitators accelerating his little ship, plasma throbbing in the tight embrace of the force field, ready to spill out into the emptiness as a thin burning beam at his wish. Besides his own eyes, clouded by the pain, he was looking at the world with dozens of eyes, and everything seen was being joined into a whole picture: the rapidly-receding frigate, the sun throwing ghostly prominences into the darkness of space, the stars burning in the velvety sphere of the heavens, the dark strip of the Void. It was a beautiful sight! And the flight under the sun and the distant stars would have been so wonderful, if not for the pain…

They had departed the frigate in Ro'on's orbit, leaving her two million kilometers above the planet. On the one hand, this ensured the secrecy, on the other, it increased the responsiveness: if Corcoran was unable to lift his vehicle from the surface, the _Commodore Litvin_ would come for them within six hours or send the Peregrines to aid them. Radio communications were not anticipated, except in case of emergency, and a console with two data probes had been attached to the module for transmitting information. The probes, position sensors, a receiver, and a navigation computer were the only modifications made to the small Faata ship; everything else in it was alien, made in the New Worlds or at an unknown star, shining on the other side of the Void.

_Everything is alien here,_ Corcoran thought, fighting the attacks of pain. Everything was alien, unearthly, even the crew: one was half-human, and the other even more of a freak, a crippled emissary of the Proteids… He forced a chuckle, sensing the even pulsation of the drive and adjusting course; only a millimeter separated the red dot from the green market. A millimeter on the screen, eight thousand kilometers in space, eighty seconds of flight time, a million searing needles piercing the skin…

The red dot melted into the green, the guidance system rang softly, and Corcoran, grasping the edges of the contact film, started to pull it away from his body. Falling out of the tight cocoon, he lay face down on the floor, stretched out his legs and sighed with relief. Siebel's warm, dry hands touched him, started to massage his neck, shoulders, and naked back, rub the back of his head.

"How are you doing? Alive?"

"Alive, alive," Corcoran rasped. "We're on course. Now I still need to land this bastard… took a lot out of me…"

The burning stopped. Invigorating warmth flowed out of Siebel's hands. A concave hemispherical screen glittered with the sparks of the stars at the front of the cabin, before the sagging spindle of the contact film. They were rushing towards Ro'on, getting a hundred kilometers closer to it with every second.

"It'll pass now," Siebel said. "There, it's all gone… You're okay."

Corcoran tried to sit up, but failed.

"Yeah, right, okay," he muttered. "I probably look like a corpse…"

"You look fine. Want to see?"

Klaus's features shifted, his face started to change rapidly: his chin narrowed, the iris turned lighter, almost melting into the whites, the lips brightened, the hair became black, short, and very thick. Corcoran was now looking at himself, the way he had appeared before his shocked crew yesterday. Vrba had not lied, no implants were necessary; the cybersurgeon, following the program, worked on his skin and eye pigmentation, and made his skin paler. There were almost no changes otherwise. Corcoran had no idea he looked so much like a Faata. The discovery was not very pleasant.

"Why so glum?" Siebel asked. "Don't like the face? It's all right, Paul, it's all right! Vera will still love you like that, and the girls won't reject their dad. Once again, you won't be a brunet forever. When we get back aboard, your red hair will return too.

_If we get back,_ Corcoran thought, but, suppressing the seditious thought before Siebel could catch it, spoke, "This is me. What will you look like?"

His friend scratched his head. _A completely human gesture,_ Corcoran thought.

"Considering my age, I should put together something more impressive… maybe six-eight hundred years. Well, for example…"

Klaus's hair grew longer, green appeared in it, his lips sagged slightly, tiny wrinkled ran from the eyes to the temples. Signs of age were not as noticeable among the long-lived Faata as they were with humans, but they were still there, appearing after several centuries, usually at the end of a millennium. Corcoran knew about this, but never tried to imagine how long he himself would live: the thought of living without Vera and, probably, seeing the deaths of his daughters, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, scared him.

Gradually, his strength came back. He stood up and, with Siebel's help, pulled on the lilac overalls, imitating Faata clothing. He had to be careful turning around in the cramped cabin, as the small battle module was not meant to transport passengers or cargo. In the wider aft part, near the entrance membrane, there were containers with food, water, and some equipment, while the guidance computer and the multiband receiver were located at the fore, on both sides of the screen. There was only enough room left for the two of them to lie down and stretch. No chairs, no cots, no tables… At least the floor was soft.

"Get some sleep," Siebel advised. "We still have a five-hour flight. You humans have a great advantage over the Faata and us… I mean my people…" He sighed. "You can sleep."

"And even dream," Corcoran added. "You consider it an advantage?"

"Of course. The ability to sleep is such a marvel, especially when your life is long! Time passes quicker…"

He moved to the receiver, sat cross-legged next to it, and ran the automated search program. A shimmering column of light flared to life, dark glyphs of the bands floated, rotating leisurely, a barely-audible crackling and a faint noise, like the roar of a distant sea, filled the cabin. The voices of the universe were whispering something, lulling Corcoran to sleep; the cosmic microwave background was spreading in a soft rustle [_The cosmic microwave background is the legacy of the era when all the matter in the universe was in a state of expanding, extremely hot plasma. The cosmic microwave background permeates the entire observable universe and has currently been studied in the ranges between the fractions of a millimeter and 50 centimeters._], Gamma Malleus was humming, the stars were chirping and squeaking, and the gas clouds were adding creaks and rattles to this melody. The orchestra of the Creation was playing a myriad instruments, everything in its realm, from measly atoms to gigantic stars and entire galaxies, and only one thing could not be heard in this choir: a living human voice.

"They're being quiet," Klaus Siebel muttered, "quiet... Quiet in the millimeter band, in the centimeter, and on the longer wavelengths too... And really, what good is radio communication to them? It'd only give away their worlds... Useless at interstellar distances, it would take a hundred years to talk to their neighbors fifteen parsecs away, and there is nothing better than psychic contact within your own system... Grow a dozen Daskin beasties, stick them on all the planets, and talk as much as you need... effective, quick, and without any chips, holograms, or vibrations of the ether..."

"Their large ship had radio devices," Corcoran reminded him.

"The Ship, yes! To listen what you're shrieking to the entire universe, and to put in a clever word. Like how they will make you better... new technology, medicine, synthetic food... Enticing, huh? Remember the riots in India and China when the Security Council rejected their request to approach Earth? The rallies, the hunger marches, the self-immolation of the crippled? No, you don't… you hadn't been born yet… But you should know about the Binucks. What do they write on the fences?.. 'Tremble, ye cursed t'ho! We will be back to spill your blood!' That's the way it is, my dear boy… the seeds of evil have been sown, and we'll have to work hard to keep them from growing…"

Klaus kept on grumbling, bent over the receiver, and that surprised Corcoran: he was used to Klaus expressing his thoughts in a clear and concise manner. But the thoughts were now also unclear, blurred, as if his friend was thinking of one thing and saying another. _Is he trying to calm me down?.._ Corcoran thought. _Or is he himself nervous and needs my support?.._

He turned on his side and asked, "Tell me, Klaus, who else knows about you? I mean your true nature… Vrba? Some people in your service? Or—"

"There are no 'ors'. It's just you."

"Are you going to tell anyone else?"

"For example?"

Siebel was his usual self again: clear, dry, surrounding his consciousness with seven mental barriers.

"For example, a loved one. Selina, if it works out between you two."

"If it works out…" Sadness suddenly rang through Klaus's voice. "I'm afraid, Paul, that, sooner or later, I will bring her sorrow, many sorrows. By your count, I'm pushing sixty; a little longer, and I'll be an old man, and old men must leave… this is how things are for you… This means that something will happen to me, something that will cause Klaus Siebel to disappear and someone else to appear. I haven't figured out how it will take place, when and where, but it must happen. There won't even be anything to cremate, as the body will not be found… Basically, Klaus will be gone, and she will be left alone… no longer young and not as attractive as she is now. Do you understand, Paul?"

He had become human, completely human, Corcoran decided. Grumbling, feeling sad, regretting, and even thinking of the future with alarm, and not even his own future but someone else's. And that could be one of the most beautiful of all human qualities…

"If I vanished now," Klaus said, "and then appeared to her in a more… hmm… appropriate guise… It's easy to disappear now, the circumstances are very suitable, since our mission is dangerous… What do you think, Paul?"

Corcoran rose on one elbow.

"Drop it! Is that some kind of a joke? What are you up to, Klaus?"

"Nothing, really."

Siebel turned away and seemed to vanish, breaking the fragile mental link that had connected them for several moments. Corcoran's thoughts shifted in a new direction seemingly of their own accord. Now, listening to the rustling and rumbling voices of the universe, he was reflecting on the coming actions, thinking of their strategic goals and the plan that would need to follow. There were three plans. The first, put together by Vrba and the fleet staff, assumed that Corcoran would circle the planet and try to feel out targets for the initial strike. Not cities, which the enemy didn't have, but monitoring, communication, and control centers, vital production sites, defensive positions, astrodromes, and orbital bases. Having done this, he was to send a data probe and then, if the prize module did not rouse suspicion, land on the surface and proceed at his own discretion. From this vague wording flowed the second, more concrete plan, which he had put together himself: capture a prisoner and take him up to the _Commodore Litvin_. A t'ho, even one of a higher caste, would not do; Corcoran remembered that dear Aunt Yo had known very little about her planet. He figured that, after landing at an astrodrome, he would be able to find a space officer, a Strategist's assistant or some other knowledgeable person, who would follow him. He had convincing arguments: the paralyzing gas and his discharger. As a last resort, there may be a combat action with the use of robots.

Of course, these plans had flaws, as they always did with little information about the enemy. They were supposed to gather the data on the defense system and the overall situation by intercepting radio transmissions, but there were none, so everything came down to visual observations. It would be impossible to clarify them while flying the module: while the module was a good cover, Corcoran would be unable to pilot it for a long period of time and would lose to Faata pilots if he had to fight. Failure was also possible when searching for knowledgeable persons, who did not wear uniforms and did not look different from their civilian brethren. This was where Corcoran put trust in his psychic probing, which was also a double-edged sword, as the Faata could just as easily scan him, especially if he encountered a Keeper.

But he was not alone now, Siebel was with him… friend Siebel, a telepath and a Metamorph… This changed the situation, opening up nearly unlimited prospects. Siebel could transport him to any part of the world, cross any walls or force fields, protect him from mental invasion, and find a person capable of providing information. He could put them on the ground straight from orbit, could teleport them back into the module or into the Peregrines, if necessary, could deal with the prisoner or, perhaps, with a quasi-sentient symbiote, could… What couldn't he do?! Kill? Well, Corcoran would have to rely on himself for that.

He thought about the third plan, which, accounting for Siebel's talents, was more realistic than the first two. Enter Ro'on's orbit? Better not, the risk was too great, and visual reconnaissance was unreliable. Jumping down, quickly, swiftly, would be the best option! Not to look for astrodromes, but set down in some secluded spot… Ro'on was large world about the size of Earth, but the population was sparse… Yo had said that there were three million people on T'har, and this place had to have twenty or fifty, a negligible population for such a planet… One could hide here… hide, and then…

Reality blended with sleepy visions, and the dreams were winning, throwing a shaky veil over the cargo-packed cabin, Siebel's figure over the receiver, the column of light with the spinning dark symbols, and the transparent, star-filled lens of the screen. Corcoran was no longer lying on the soft floor; he was floating in weightlessness: his hands were wrapped around his knees, his head was lowered to his chest, his dark hair fell on his shoulders, his eyes were closed. A strange sensation gripped him: he was a man, hanging in a tiny room, entwined with tubes and wires, and, at the same time, was looking at him from the side, as if splitting into a participant and a spectator of some mysterious scene. It was static: nothing moved or stirred, and the naked dark-haired man looked dead or immersed in deep meditation indistinguishable from death. But Corcoran had no doubt that he was alive; that was evidenced by the weak but detectable pulses of the psychic field.

He sensed an empty space beyond the walls of the chamber, and an even larger one, full of sun and light, above, as if the chamber and the adjacent room were hidden deep underground. For Corcoran, a noncorporeal spirit, walls were not an obstacle; slipping through the one with the shimmering entrance membrane, he found himself in a room with a soft floor and a number of alcoves, some as narrow as slits, while others were wider, but just as dark; maybe they were hallways leading somewhere deep into the underground dwelling. He didn't stay here: he felt oppressed by the darkness, the silence, and the motionless, and the powerful premonition of freedom, which a bird got from the open sky, tormented him.

Piercing the soil with the interwoven roots, he soared above the flat top of the hill. The view turned out to be familiar: the circular groves, scattered over elevations, the trees with umbrella-shaped canopies, the prairie, overgrown with the blue-green grass, gradually descending to the river, the bright orange sun. Like a helium-filled balloon, Corcoran flew up, surveying the rivers and the valleys, the forests and the hills of the continent that opened up under him. To the south, it ended in a mountain range, beyond which lay the blue sea and the rocky shore of another landmass; to the west and east, beyond the oceans, there were other lands, which he had never seen but knew for certain that they existed and that they were not deserted or abandoned. There was no snow, ice, or tundra to the north; instead, there were rocky plateaus, cut up by gorges; their grey, yellow, ocher slopes framed the lush greenery of the subtropical forests. This northern land, stretching for thousands of kilometers in latitude, was almost barren and, therefore, uninhabited.

The feeling of motion did not leave Corcoran, but was it born of that fantastic flight that only happened in dreams, or of something more real? It seemed to him that he was flying with the stream of thought rushing into the darkness of space, to other worlds and the tiny creations of human hands, lost in the vast emptiness. For an instant, he managed to spot his own ship orbiting Ro'on, then angular, box-like craft, a transport caravan heading to T'har or, perhaps, to the outer planet; then the planet itself with a retinue of moons and the dark, grim rock of Obscurus. He slipped past a moon; the psychic waves drawing him farther and farther, to the very edges of the system, where he saw the human cruisers moving in battle formation. It looked like the Commodore was heading for the protostar to blockade the shipyard; Corcoran understood his decision, as if he saw it written in a report using glyphs. He didn't have time to marvel at this, as something changed, interrupting his flight: maybe the dream had been exhausted at this spot, or there was another reason to return to reality. He listened, still half-asleep. It seemed as if the tune of the guidance system had grown louder and more piercing… This made him wake up.

The warm gloom of the cabin enveloped Corcoran; Siebel's figure still lurked like a blurred shadow at the receiver, glyphs continued to float in the column of light, but the screen was showing a different picture: in it, blocking out the stars, was the white, green, and blue sphere of Ro'on.

He half-rose and inquired in a voice still raspy from sleep, "Do you hear anything, Klaus?"

"Nothing. Useless!" Siebel slapped the receiver's panel, then lifted a finger to his forehead. "We need to listen with this! We'll get in orbit and–"

"We won't," Corcoran said, pulling off his clothes. "We'll get on the ground and hide. In the mountains, I think."

"Why?"

"I saw a Dream. I saw a man in t'hami and a familiar place: the hill with trees by the river. Then, the entire continent… There is a suitable site to the north: mountains, gorges, plateaus. Basically, an uninhabited land. And…"

"And?.." Siebel repeated, instantly alert. "Was there something else?"

"Yes. The Commodore… I think he's planning to attack Obscurus. No, I don't think, I'm certain!"

His friend nodded.

"Fantastic! So, you've reached out to the comet cloud… Your power is growing, Paul!"

"Maybe." Naked and grim, Corcoran stepped to the contact film. "Let's check how powerful I am."

The flexible shell closed around him, and his nerve centers were instantly pierced by thousands of needles. If not for this torture, he would be feeling pleasure: the link to the ship was stronger and closer than in the most advanced human UFs like Peregrines and Harpies. It remained a mystery how the Faata had achieved this; perhaps it was done not through tricks of technology but by adapting the living organism to the flying craft. As for Corcoran, he was adapted poorly, even though he was descended from the aliens; then again, even they, besides their pilots, would be unable to operate this diabolical machine.

Fighting through the pain, he slowed down in the upper atmosphere. The appearance of the planet was changing with the familiar rhythm: first, an enormous convex spheroid with clumps of clouds, then a green-blue bowl whose edges rose up, and, finally, a flat surface, covered by multicolored spots of plains, lakes, and mountains. He raced along the meridian, from the South Pole to the North, barely having time to note the terrain features. He passed the narrow and long southern landmass, reminiscent of Cuba, but twenty times the size; beyond it was a sea, or, rather, a strait, separating it from the largest continent. It was exactly how he saw it in the recent Dream: a narrow coastal plain in tropical greenery, a mountain range and the area beyond it with forests and steppes, lakes, and rivers. Some of the bodies of water were large, and, streaking over them like a meteor, Corcoran watched the sun reflect in the crystal clear waters. He was unable to notice anything else: the flight was swift, and the pain clouded his thoughts. He did have time to muse that this world was at least as good as Gondwana and maybe even better; after all, Ro'on already had sentient beings making the planet more comfortable. And he, Corcoran, was a messiah, who had come to exile them! Or destroy them, if they refused to obey.

There was justice in that, dictated not only by thoughts of revenge but also, as it seemed to him, by the laws of the universe, independent of human will, defining the essence of Creation at the moment of the Big Bang. One of them stated that, for every action, there was an equal and opposite reaction, which meant that every race in the galaxy, every being, sentient or not, had the right to fight if attacked. The concept of retaliation had been an axiom throughout all of Earth's history and had never been called into question; the issue was never whether one should strike back but whether there was enough strength for a reciprocal action. Despite Commodore Vrba's words that they should not rush in with plasma throwers and annihilators, they did have both, which would serve as the most compelling argument in any negotiations and contacts. Then again, even if the weapons did not fire, the axiom would not change: the mere appearance of the flotilla from Earth would be a counterstrike.

The module, obeying Corcoran's thought, went down sharply. Its velocity dropped to several meters per second, the green carpet of vegetation under the craft was replaced by mountains, barren screes, gentle slopes, colored here and there by bright spots of moss or lichen. There were probably winds here, fighting the rocks for millions of years; Corcoran did not see any pointed peaks, but he did see bizarre-looking cliffs, reminiscent of Hindu temples or carved Chinese pagodas. The bumpy surface of the plateau was cut up by multiple cracks, which, from above, looked like a web of thin dark lines, thrown over canvas primed with brown, yellow, and grey. They continued descending, making the stone canvas come closer to the module, and the cracks turned to deep canyons; the sun lit up their upper part, making the quartz and mica particles glitter, but the bottom was not visible. Deciding that these cracks could serve as an ideal cover, Corcoran directed the module into one of the gorges, making it hover between the steep walls, and looked around. He thought he saw the bottom about a hundred to a hundred fifty meters below… It was difficult to estimate the distance: his skin was on fire, his head swam, and his strength was almost gone.

He set the craft down, got out of the cocoon, and froze, resting his hands on the wall. His legs trembled, his forehead was covered in sweat, and somewhere inside him there were strange perturbations: his heart was once again becoming his heart, his lungs returned to being his lungs, not parts of the diabolical machine. Corcoran heard the snap of a container, then cold metal touched his shoulder blade, and the skin pulled away for an instant; that was an ampoule's vacuum suction.

"Well? Feeling better?" Siebel asked, putting the medical unit into the pocket of his backpack.

"This damned tin can…" Corcoran muttered and started to get dressed. He put on his overalls and boots, feeling the tranquilizer return elasticity to his muscles, and asked. "Were you able to notice anything? Structures, landing pads, crews, any interesting object… What did you see, Klaus?"

"Structures… yes, structures, crews, machines, farmland," Siebel replied slowly. "There is something, but on a modest scale, shall we say. On the surface, there are t'ho dwellings and small distributed industry. No astrodromes or enterprises comparable to what we saw on Obscurus. We…" He paused, then clarified. "My people know little about the Faata civilization of the Third Phase; I don't mean technology or ambitions of their leaders, but ordinary life. Now I know a little more. While we were flying, I scanned the local mental fields on the southern and northern continents. There are cavities and caves, especially in the mountains by the sea, and all of them are inhabited… there are about three hundred brains, small and medium-sized Daskin beasts, also hidden underground… there are arsenals with machines, there are mines for extracting raw minerals, there are reproductive centers, which you call incubators… there are places similar to laboratories… What else interests you?"

"The planetary control center, if one exists. Well, and the place where they grow brains. The largest quasi-sentients."

"These are present on the coast. I noted several… large, larger than others, but still in the development stage; they are probably being grown for the shipyard on Obscurus. As for the control centers, each continent has its own. Three continents, three Sheaves, three governing bodies… The local one, I think, is hidden deep under the coastal range. You can check for yourself. If you've managed to reach our flotilla, then it's no trouble at all for you to probe the planetary background."

But Corcoran did not wish to check anything, since the landing had taken a lot out of him. They activated the guard robot, left the module, looked admiringly at the silver spider nimbly climbing up the wall of the canyon, and, when it reached the plateau and made measurements, discovered that darkness would fall in three hours twenty-seven minutes. Then they opened the box with canned goods, had a bite in the twilight and the coolness, among the picturesque granite boulders, scattered here and there, after which Corcoran started working with the combat robots, while Siebel began to program the data probe, inputting the map taken by the guidance computer into its memory and dictating his own comments.

The two combat machines were the bulkiest cargo in their gear. Activating the unfolding program, Corcoran watched as the metallic chests turned into massive giants with six limbs, finger-claws, and weapon hemispheres bulging where the upper pair of arms joined the torso. After the metamorphosis ended, he sent one of the robots up, to the spider guard, leaving the other one in the gorge. Their main task was to protect the module, but, if necessary, they could also be used as modes of transportation, cargo carriers, diggers, and mobile labs for physical and chemical analysis. Of course, they could only be used at the landing site, as it was doubtful that Siebel could teleport these machines, each weighing over a metric ton, somewhere else.

It grew dark, and stars flared in the narrow strip of the sky visible from the gorge. Siebel finished his work: the thin cylinder of the data probe silently rose above the module, froze for an instant, and sped away straight up like a silver arrow. Corcoran's strength had returned; opening the weapons container, he affixed a miniature laser discharger on his right wrist, a recording and communication device in the form of a bracelet on his left, hung a plasma thrower on his belt, put batteries, food concentrate, a flask, and a med kit into his backpack. Then he closed his eyes and listened.

A silent roar of voices, rapid incoherent mumbling, blurry images, a surge of others' emotions filled his mind. Mental waves flowed over the planet, whirled in eddies, mixed, overlapped, and, for a time, Corcoran felt deafened, as if he suddenly found himself in the middle of a huge crowd, where each person was saying something different, and his ear caught only bits of phrases, separate words and shouts. It was very different on Earth, where mental emissions did not attack him with thunder and roar, but rustled quietly, and he could always tune himself to the right wave. _It's not easy being a telepath in on a world of telepaths_, Corcoran thought, trying to concentrate and feel out an order in the cacophony sounding in his head. The term "sound" did not completely fit here, neither did the other related terms, such as "see", "hear", "feel", but the languages of Earth lacked more appropriate words; perhaps, they would appear in a century or two, when telepathic communication was no longer a rarity.

And so, he listened, and, gradually, in the chaos of the signals, powerful clear pulses appeared, streaming from southwest, from the farthest tip of the continent. These waves seemed to support many others, which were weaker and less clear but more understandable, for the information they carried was in Faata'liu. For the most part, they were brief orders to t'ho, but he was able to make out something more interesting: five or six people were discussing some problem related to genetics, and these words reached Corcoran's consciousness along with the sense of helplessness accompanying them. _Mo r'ari…_ All was useless…

Siebel appeared from inside the module, and, hearing the rustling steps, Corcoran opened his eyes. His friend was ready to travel: his tight-fitting dark violet clothing reached from the neck to the ankles, on his back, melting into the overalls, was a flat backpack-container, his left arm boasted a gleaming communication bracelet, and a small bag was strapped to his belt. It was unusual to see him like this: with the face of an elderly Faata, with long black hair and a beak-shaped mouth. Klaus did not bring any weapons, but something was bulging in his bag, an oval palm-sized object.

_A gas capsule_? Corcoran thought. _No, a capsule has a different shape._

"Scanning the field?" Siebel asked. "Well, what are your impressions?"

"You're right, there's something in the mountains to the south. A psychic exchange against the background of powerful rhythmic pulses… Is that the quasi-sentients? Those who are still immature?"

"Yes. Do you want to go to them?"

"Not right now, Klaus. First, we will visit a different place."

Catching his thought, Siebel nodded.

"The place you saw in the Dreams? The hill, river, trees… What attracts you to it?"

"That guy in t'hami. He seems to be a very knowledgeable person. And if he still hasn't awoken…"

"We'll catch him with his pants down; is that how you say?" Siebel's teeth flashed in a smirk. All right, we'll go to the hill then. Imagine this place and send the picture to me… okay, that's enough…"

The dark sky, the gorge, and module, and the robot standing nearby suddenly disappeared, and light hit Corcoran's eyes. They were standing on a slope of the hill, behind the circle of trees, whose canopies looked like giant umbrellas made out of interwoven branches and big leaves. A plain spread out before them, and, five-six kilometers to the west, the surface of a river and the white domes of short, stretched buildings gleamed. The river was exactly as Corcoran remembered it: calm, wide, colored by the glow of the pink reflection of the setting sun. Night had already set on the plateau, but it was still evening here, and it was probably half-an-hour before dark. The enormous solar disk hung low over the waters and the steppe, and the grass, or, perhaps, the moss, no longer seemed blue-green but purple, almost black. No movement was visible on the plain and by the river: no people, no platforms floating towards the buildings, no other mechanisms.

As if sleepwalking, Corcoran took a few steps down the hill. His eyes continued to stare at the river and the buildings by the bank.

"Where are you going, Paul?" Siebel's voice made him wake up.

"I… You see, Klaus, this landscape appeared in my Dreams, but I was unable to take even a single step towards the river. The genetic memory was silent. And now I'm here and–"

"We've discussed this," Siebel interrupted him. "Your ancestor never came down to the riverbank, which is why you have no memories of that. I don't think you have anything to do by the river. There are a few hundred t'ho, an overseer Faata, and a small brain. They're making nutrient concentrates from grass."

But Corcoran barely heard him. A new thought gripped him, hitting him with the suddenness of lightning, taking his breath away. He turned around, examined the flat top of the hill, visible among the tree trunks, and muttered, "The man in t'hami… the one from whom I inherited the psychic gift and the memories… the one who has lived here for many years… Lord of Emptiness! He's my parent! My father!"

"Biological," Siebel reminded him calmly. "Don't measure the Faata by your Earth yardstick, they lack any kinship ties. This so-called father of yours is a parent to a thousand t'ho and, perhaps, a dozen fully sentient beings. The fact of his semen fertilizing the ovum, from which you came, is not a cause for any emotions. And if you remember how it was done… what they did to your mother… there, on their damned Ship…"

A chill ran down Corcoran's spine. Siebel was right, as always: aboard that damned ship, Abby McNeil had been subjected to a vile and despicable rape, being treated as if she was an animal, a lab rat or a guinea pig. And the man whose name he bore, Richard Corcoran, had an even worse fate: he had been tortured and killed. Yes, Siebel was right! If there was someone he should consider his father, it would be Corcoran, Litvin, or even Klaus himself, the Metamorph Exile…

He nodded sharply and furiously and started heading back up the hill, to the umbrella-shaped trees. There was a grove beyond them, which he had seen in the Dreams: short soft grass, surrounding by a circle of tree trunks, and, in the middle, was a gigantic tree, whose branches spread out horizontally over twenty-thirty meters. Siebel was walking next to him, tilting his head to one side, as if listening to something, and the grimace on his face was entirely not Faata-like. Surprise? Revulsion? No, more like disgust, Corcoran decided.

They entered the grove, but had barely taken a dozen steps, when they heard a commanding shout. Four people were heading towards them in rapid strides: muscular, half-naked burly men, pale and hairless, wearing belts or some sort of harness, like gladiator armor. Their faces appeared ugly to Corcoran, although everything seemed to be in the right place: strong cheekbones and chins, broad noses, European lips, grey, almost transparent eyes. Nearly identical faces, he thought; like that of the mentally retarded, and just as worn out, as if they had been sculpted from clay and smoothed over with a wet rag. Definitely not handsome fellows… no comparison to Aunt Yo.

"Olks," Siebel said calmly. "There must really be a high-ranking Faata living here, if his lair is guarded."

"They have paralyzers," Corcoran whispered, noticing the weapons hanging on their belts. "Well, let me calm them down." He raised the hand with the discharger, but Siebel shook his head.

"No need, Paul. We're Faata, and no t'ho will harm us. Talk to them for a few minutes. They are under a small brain's control, and I will quickly deal with that creature. A bit dumb but obedient… it's not a ship's quasi-sentient."

Corcoran stepped forward and cawed, "Hr'doa! Halt!" simultaneously sending an authoritative pulse. The guards froze, bending their arms in the gesture of obedience; they must have finally got a closer look at who had arrived. Then, shifting from one foot to the other, they started muttering.

"Fully sentient…"

"You cannot, fully sentient…"

"Cannot be here…"

"Home of Dyte…"

"Dyte, the Keeper of Communications…"

"Cannot, fully sentient…"

"Must leave…"

"Can request a module…"

"Fly away…"

"Dyte, the Keeper… Cannot…"

Suddenly, their eyes rolled back, and all four of them collapsed onto the grass. Alive, Corcoran noted: the guards' breathing was rhythmic, and they seemed to be in a state of deep sleep.

"Well, that's done," Siebel said. "The brain shut them down. Once they wake up, they won't remember us."

He started for the tree in the middle of the grove, but Corcoran called out to his friend.

"Wait. Let's hide them somewhere."

Dragging the sleeping olks to the hillside with thick grass, they examined the top of the hill. Five or six paces away from the central tree, they found the circular lens of a force field, slightly coming out of the ground. Such devices acted as doors and locks for the Faata and only opened under the influence of psychic pulses at the proper frequency. Most likely, there were stairs or a gravlift beyond the membrane, leading down, into Keeper Dyte's abode. _A high title!_ Corcoran thought, trying to drown out the thought that Dyte was his parent. The hierarchy of a Sheaf, the ruling group on a world of the Third Phase, had been known from the chronicle dating back to Admiral Timokhin's days. The first was the Pillar of Order, an overlord with unlimited authority, the second was the Strategist, the Guardian of the Heavens, the third was the Intermediary, the Speaker with the Bino Tegari, which was what the Faata called aliens. The Keeper of Communications came fourth; his task was to control the quasi-sentients, their reproduction and programming. Obviously, Keepers were chosen for their natural gift, special abilities for telepathic communication, but the path of the other rulers to the heights of power was completely unknown. It was believed that personal qualities, experience, and age played a part; in fact, the lifespan was the deciding factor: those who passed the threshold of three-four centuries, naturally, had plenty of experience.

"Let me connect to the Daskin bastard and open the membrane," Siebel informed him. "We could teleport, but I can't imagine the layout of this dungeon… your Dream is so unclear…"

His eyes glazed over for an instant, and blue sparks started flowing through the membrane. The force lens clouded, then disappeared; behind it was a well, illuminated by a dim light.

"Looks like a gravity shaft," Corcoran said. "Let's go down, Klaus."

He stepped into the emptiness first, and picked up by the air stream, started to slowly descend. Siebel followed. His fingers were feeling for something in the bag hanging at his belt, and Corcoran thought it might be a weapon. A sleeping gas canister, an oblivion serum, basically, an option not resulting in a fatality. Throughout all the centuries he had spent on Earth, Siebel had never learned to kill.

The descent ended. Through the lower membrane, they passed into a large room with light bars crossing the ceiling. Corcoran was unable to say anything specific about this room's outlines: its walls bent smoothly, forming multiple alcoves, depressions, and protrusions, like in a grotto, where none of the surfaces were worked into familiar even surfaces, but left in their natural state and only polished. Some of the alcoves drowned in the darkness, while others were filled with light, and a transparent mass glittered in it, something like large pieces of crystal, gathered in bizarre druses. Some of the depressions, located on the wall at different levels, turned out to be empty, and patches of light flicked and flashed rhythmically in them. The odd-shaped ceiling with the streams of light bars increased the sense of foreignness, just as sharp as what Corcoran had felt aboard the Silmarri starship. This was surprising: the Silmarri were not humanoid, while the Faata were, despite everything.

Siebel appeared to remain indifferent to the appearance of the underground dwelling. He froze near one of the alcoves, which transitioned into a small chamber, covered by gloom; there was some sort of complex mechanism, entangled with rings of hoses and tubes with oval suckers, and they could see a disk on the floor, either made of metal or some metal-like plastic. A momentary recollection pierced Corcoran: naked and writhed, he was hovering in the air above this disk, and tubes and wires were reaching out to his body.

"A t'hami chamber," Siebel spoke, examining the alcove and the device. "And, as far as I understand, it's empty. Keeper Dyte is busy somewhere else, probably programming the brains near the southern sea." He turned to Corcoran. "Well, what is out next step? Do we wait here, or shall we head to the quasi-sentients?"

"I'd like to look around and record all this." Activating the bracelet, Corcoran gazed around the room. "There are plenty of curiosities here, what we hadn't seen in their broken ship. Don't you think, Klaus? For example, this thing…"

He pointed at an alcove with the crystals, but Siebel did not reply. His face suddenly grew focused; he was again receiving mental waves, and Corcoran felt their silent echo touch his mind. Standing in the twilight of someone else's home, among the bizarrely-curved walls, they were listening to the voices flying over the planet, like cries of a flock of birds. Then they looked at one another, and Siebel spoke.

"He knows someone has gotten inside his home. The brain has informed him. I could have blocked the signals, but…"

"It's not necessary, Klaus. Let him come. As long as he doesn't bring olks with him."

Siebel shook his head, "He's returning alone. He's confident in his abilities. He has no need for olks. He's in a flying craft and will arrive in a few minutes."

"Well, then," Corcoran said, "we'll wait."


	9. Chapter 8

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (__Ответный__удар__) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Chapter 8**

**Ro'on, the central continent**

Siebel stepped into a dark, empty alcove.

"Paul, listen to me." His voice quietly rustled under the room's ceiling. "This Keeper, your hypothetical parent… Tell me, what do you want from him?"

"Mutual understanding," Corcoran replied. "We are planning on exiling them from here, and we will do that. But we'd rather do it without plasma throwers or annihilators."

"And if a peaceful outcome turns out to be impossible?"

"Then we can, at least, get some information. Who lives here, on Ro'on, and on T'har and Aezat, who rules the Sheaves, and what do they wish. What if one of these rulers turns out to be more compliant?.. Commodore Vrba wants to avoid bloodshed."

"Are you sure about that? I've heard his father and brother were killed at the Battle of the Martian Orbit…"

"That doesn't mean anything, Klaus. I mean the thoughts of revenge… The Commodore has instructions from the Parliament and the USF headquarters, and he will carry them out from the first letter to the last period."

"Besides his relatives, millions of people died on Earth," Siebel reminded him.

"Yes," Corcoran agreed. "But is this worth the destruction of millions of t'ho? Here, on Ro'on, T'har, and Aezat?"

"Are you saying that because you're half-Faata?"

"No! Because I'm human."

After a minute of silence, Siebel grunted, "The world is changing, and so are you… For the best, I think. I will help you, Paul. I'll be here, next to you, but this Keeper will not see or sense me. It's a sort-of small psychic trick… If something goes wrong, I will intervene. Be ready."

"Do you have a weapon?" Corcoran inquired. "A gas canister in your bag?"

"No. It's a hypnoglyph [_A hypnoglyph is an object capable of putting people into a light hypnotic trance or completely deprive them of their will. Examples of simple hypnoglyphs include an earworm that keeps playing over and over in the head; a small, specially made piece of wood or plastic for twirling, squeezing, or rubbing; rhythmic flashes of light that force a person to keep looking. Hypnoglyphs made by the Lo'ona Aeo resonate with the humanoid brain rhythms and have a much greater effect; in practical terms, they are psychotropic weapons._]. One of the hypnoglyphs supplied by the Lo'ona Aeo in limited numbers and only for the needs of certain government structures. Have you heard of such things?"

"I don't recall. How does it work?"

"It paralyzes the consciousness. You've already looked at it. A little bit."

That trinket in Siebel's cabin, Corcoran remembered. That object, covered by a cap, that looked like a small octopus with bunches of colored spots, gliding on its surface… The thing that he wanted to take in his hands, put it close to his face, and look, and look, and look…

"That's the one," Siebel confirmed, catching his thought. "It puts a person in trance and suppresses their ability to resist. It's guaranteed to work on all humanoids, especially telepaths."

"What about you?"

"I'm not a humanoid," Siebel said with a dry laugh. "My gift is of a different nature."

They fell silent. Corcoran stood in the middle of the dungeon, facing the gravity shaft, while Siebel was hiding in the twilight of one of the alcoves. His face was not visible, only a vague outline, almost merging with the walls. The stream of mental pulses, flowing from him to Corcoran, suddenly stopped, as if the lock gates cutting off the stream of water. Now, even in the mental space Siebel was an indiscernible ghost, a shadow among whispering shadows.

"He's here," Corcoran heard several minutes later. "Heading for the lift. He thinks you're from the crew of the ship that invaded us. He thinks that the ship has returned, and that Yata has sent you."

"He's in for a surprise," Corcoran muttered, looking at the shaft membrane.

Dim sparks played on the force veil, outlining a dark figure. An instant later, a man slipped out of the lift. He was short, slender, and moved with the grace of a ballet dancer. Silver eyes, narrow chin, small puffy mouth, long dark hair… His features were similar to Yo's, and this memory stung Corcoran's soul. As if his childhood had come back to him, and a quiet voice spoke, _T'taia orr n'uk'uma sirend'agi patta…_

But it was not dear Aunt Yo before him, it was Keeper of Communications Dyte, the fourth in the Sheaf, who was used to subordinate and dominate. Faata'liu, the Faata language, sounded curtly and harshly in his lips.

"You are my offspring." A mental probe touched Corcoran's mind. "You are my offspring, but not from a ksa… Does this mean that Yata's journey was successful? He found a race similar to us? More than the Kni'lina? Similar enough to…"

A mental pulse brought an image: a naked woman with a bloated belly and legs bent to her chest. Dark-haired, thin-faced, fragile, very different from Corcoran's mother, but, at the sight, he felt a sudden burst of fury. It was still her, Abby McNeil, prisoner aboard the Faata ship, raped, defiled… Maybe not by this man, but by his compatriots, unceremonious, cruel, who considered only themselves to be sentient.

He suppressed his rage and said, "Yata reached my homeworld, whose people really are similar to yours, and started a massacre. Many millions have died, many were maimed, and the ruins of our cities still hold the memory of this. But everything that has happened, happened… We are ready to forget."

"We?" Bewilderment flashed in the Keeper's thoughts. "We… Are you not a Faata? Not my offspring?"

"Probably yours," Corcoran admitted with a sigh. "But that's not important. I am the offspring of the victors."

"Naturally. Of Yata."

His certainty was iron-clad, and Corcoran spoke with a vindictive feeling, "You're mistaken, Keeper. We have destroyed Yata. The entire crew of his ship and the quasi-sentient beast controlling it. Nothing remained, except the debris at one of our planet's poles."

He transmitted a visual image: the giant tower of the starship in the Antarctic ice, the holes and cracks gaping in the hull, gloomy hallways with the mangled floor, the extinguished Observation Sphere on the central bridge, and bodies, bodies, bodies… This was a fragment from the video recorded by the experts of the Research Corps, one of the first groups to get inside the ship. A historical recording! Ten-twelve years ago, they had started to take the ship apart, and it was now half-disassembled.

"But you yourself–" the Keeper started.

"I am a victim of an experiment, a forced and, fortunately, singular one," Corcoran spoke with a grim smile. "I hold no warm feelings for either Yata, Iveh, or any of other dead Faata, and not even you, Keeper. Did you hear what I said? Yata exterminated a great number of sentient beings on my home planet, no less than there are in the New Worlds, and, perhaps, even more. We don't have t'ho, and the life of every person is…"

He wanted to say "sacred", which would be a great deviation from the truth, but that was not what stopped him: the Faata language lacked any religious terms. Perhaps, they also had once invented the Almighty Power, God and the Devil, Heaven and Hell, but all that had been left in the past: the two Eclipses, the two disasters of their civilization, had proven that God cares not for people and that they could create their own troubles and misfortunes without the Devil's help.

Keeper Dyte suddenly leaned towards Corcoran, peering into his face.

"Yata's Ship died… But you are here, in the New Worlds! For what purpose? And how did you get here?" The Keeper's pupils gleamed. "You were not born of a ksa, but you have the mind of a Faata, not a Bino Tegari… You are a dark-spawn! Do you understand what this means? I can penetrate your mind and find the answers to any question!"

Corcoran staggered. Burning clamps gripped his brain. Perhaps, it was not clamps but a drill: spinning with a maddening speed, it dug deeper and deeper into the brain tissue, pulling it into the constant rotation of the steel tip. The barriers Corcoran attempted to put up were crushed, broken, and left in ruins; his defenses fell, unable to hold back the pressure of the powerful alien will that was rummaging through his mind, pulling out various memories, examining the discoveries unceremoniously, and tossing them away indifferently. Following the spinning of the drill, the memories were unreeling like an anchor chain that was falling into a sea chasm; it slipped by, link after link, against Corcoran's will, and each of them echoed by a flashback.

He was again submerging into his childhood years, saw his home in the Holmy, the familiar faces of Mother, Yo, and Litvin, hearing their voices; other recollections slipped past: the school building in Smolensk, the azure waters of Alcúdia Bay, the ancient fortress over the Dnieper, pulling the half-forgotten friends of those days with them, his buddy Seryoga, Jose Gutiérrez, his classmates, girls and boys; then the housings of the Baikonur Academy rose, Brian Cox's fierce mug, the concrete slabs of the astrodrome, and the Kites, soaring into the sky on bright flaming pillars. He was once again racing over the Dead Man's Plateau in the gloomy Venusian sky and listened to the grumbling of the instructor, again, staggering and stumbling, trudged through the Indian jungle, the heavy burden of Sergeant Cox on his back, again looking into Vanya Sazhin's dead face, who was being dragged by Barré and Larsen, again, like fourteen years ago, he was kissing Vera in the birch grove and tasting her sweet lips. Then the cozy wardroom of the _Genghis Khan_ opened up before him, the glasses held by his comrades-in-arms clinked, their smiles blossoming: they were celebrating Lyuba's birth… The shipyard flashed past, the bulging hull of the _Europe_ appeared, lit up by floodlights, and, immediately, Karel Vrba's stern face. "What will I have to do?" "Whatever the situation demands…"

The cruisers… Six enormous cruisers, like six silver arrows, floated through the darkness and the cold of his mind. Special Task Force 37, Operation Counterstrike… Leaving the Oort cloud, the ships were moving in battle formation. Death and destruction were hiding in the maws of their annihilators, their goal was Obscurus, and, in a few hours, the fiery rain would fall upon the asteroid, crushing the force fields… Corcoran wanted to keep this secret knowledge, but the drill gnawing at him was merciless. Maybe not a drill but clamps: they were squeezing the memories out of him along with his life.

He groaned helplessly, trying to overcome the alien will gripping him, and suddenly felt free. Flashes of color flickered in front of him, disappearing immediately, along with the excruciating pain; the chain clanged, stopped, and disappeared. With his shaking hands, Corcoran felt for the med-kit, touched the necessary buttons, and pressed the device to the back of his hand. The world of visions, sounds, and whispers, that were flowing to him from his past life, suddenly dissolved, replaced by the reality: the gloomy room with alcoves in the walls, the strips of light on the ceiling, the flickering of the crystals, and the figure of the Keeper, frozen next to one of the alcoves.

Siebel leapt out of it like a bat out of hell. "Well, Paul, now you know what deep mental probing is like. Not the most pleasant experience, is it? He would've sucked everything out of you, and then given you a heart attack with a stroke… or shut off your respiratory center, or thought of something else… that's your daddy… Well, no matter! You're young, strong, and need to lean… how else will you learn if not through mental combat?" Rounding the motionless Faata, Klaus lowered himself to the floor behind his back and noted happily. "Our Keeper is a strong one! Can't take control of him without an amplifier… But we're managed to deal with him. One way or another, we did it!"

"Hrr…" Corcoran forced out. "What's with him, Klaus? What did you do? I don't see anything."

"And you won't; I've blocked your perception. It's like a selective block of the visual centers… But he can see! So can I, by the way. The play of colors is just amazing… marvelous flows… I'm talking about the Lo'ona Aeo hypnoglyph; it's there, in the alcove, on the floor… He sees it and will continue to look at this thing until the end of time, unless I deactivate it. And while he's looking, he's yours, my friend. Ask him whatever you want!"

Corcoran stared at the Keeper. His pale skin had gone even paler with shades of blue, sweat appeared on his forehead, his lips drooped, and the eyes seemed to be the shards of a silver mirror. His biological father, whose seed had been brought by the Faata ship… the man who had nearly killed him… It was strange, but he did not feel hate towards Dyte. Then again, he didn't feel any sense of kinship towards him either.

The drug in the med-kit was working. His hands stopped shaking, and his head cleared.

"Do you hear me, Keeper?" Corcoran spoke. "Can you answer?"

"Yes." Just one word, no mental images. It would appear that his psychic communication ability was being paralyzed by the hypnoglyph.

"Tell me, what do you want? What is your goal? Why did you send a ship to us? What do you want with Earth?"

Dyte's lips moved. His speech was clipped but understandable; the sharp, clicking language of the Faata sounded like cracks of a whip.

"Ships must fly… fly farther and farther… from star to star… fly, expanding the borders… new worlds… many new worlds… settle them, grow a generation of t'ho and quasi-sentients, build a Ship… one of Those Who Stand by the Sphere will take it… the strongest, the wises, the oldest… one who will be the Pillar of Order… who will fly to search for his own world… farther and farther… to never again have an Eclipse…"

The Faata went silent.

"Farther and farther," Siebel repeated thoughtfully. "You know, Paul, they basically want the same thing you do. I think the drive towards expansion is in the very nature of humanoids. Let's just take those same Kni'lina…"

Corcoran knew nothing of the Kni'lina, as humanity had yet to encounter this race, but he was prepared to agree with Siebel. The history of any people on Earth: whether ancient, like the Egyptians, the Greeks, the Romans, or modern, like the English and the Russians, the Spanish, the Scandinavians, and the others, came down to, essentially, expansion of their territory, enslavement of those weaker than them, capture of their wealth, annexation of their lands, and, if the defeated resisted, mass genocide. The drive towards expansion was inherent in both the nations of the West and the countries of the East, without any regard for cultural, lifestyle, or religious differences; Alexander the Great had sought to take India, the Romans had wanted Parthia, the Crusaders had conquered Palestine, the Russians had done the same with Siberia, while hordes of Persians, Huns, Arabs, and Mongols had rolled into Europe from the Asian mountains and steppes. Expansion had become the race's instinct, and the more civilized times had not changed anything: Earth was divided, and now was the time to divvy up the galaxy.

Ships needed to fly farther and farther, Corcoran thought. They needed to fly, and humanity's star empire needed to expand… That was inevitable, otherwise, it would stagnate and come to an end. A population of twelve billion, all of them needing air, food, and water, living space, raw materials for factories, and other conditions for reproduction… So the Third Phase would have to make room. Revenge for the fallen was only an excuse, but the real reason was because T'har, Ro'on, and Aezat were as suitable for humans as they were for the Faata.

"Name your leaders," Corcoran ordered. "Those who rule here, on Ro'on. How many of them are there?"

"Three Pillars of Order," came the reply. "Waira on this continent… Yass beyond the southern M'ar'nehadi Sea… and Foyn."

The Keeper went silent.

"Continue!"

"In this condition, he can only answer to specific questions," Siebel explained. "Formulate them more clearly."

"Yes," Corcoran nodded, "of course. Listen to me, Keeper… You already know about the warships on the edge of your system. If they are not enough, more will come, just as powerful and in greater numbers. But we don't wish to kill you, even though the Pillar of Order who had come to Earth did not shy away from killing. We only wish for you to leave. Go back to your own worlds, to your galactic arm! Leave beyond the Void!" Pausing to allow the thought to reach Dyte's consciousness, he asked. "Is that technically feasible?"

"It is," Dyte confirmed, staring at the dark alcove.

"Are you prepared to comply?"

"No. Never!"

"What do you intend to do in case of attack?"

"We will destroy you."

Siebel, still sitting on the floor, sighed.

"He's convinced they can do it. A very, very aggressive race… and so full of self-confidence…"

"We don't have to deal with all the Pillars of Order, only one" Corcoran said. "Who is more cautious and reasonable? Waira, perhaps? Or Yass? Or Foyn?"

A hoarse gurgle came out of the captive's throat. Corcoran did not know how to interpret these sounds; it was similar to a laugh, but the Faata did not know how to laugh or smile.

"The Pillars of Order will not talk to Bino Tegari! None of them! Only destroy!"

"I'm afraid it's their instinctive reaction," Siebel commented.

"But Yata and Iveh negotiated with Timokhin. If I recall, the transcript recording is over thirty hours long. They were trying to agree on the terms–"

"I didn't forget, Paul. But don't flatter yourself. What negotiations? It was nothing but a ruse! And the Keeper isn't trying to trick us. We're not in the Solar System, we're in the New Worlds, and this is a completely different situation."

"All right," Corcoran said with a long face. "Then let's talk of other things. The most vulnerable place in your defense network… Do you hear me, Keeper? Answer!"

Another long hoarse gurgle… Then, exhaling, as if overcoming himself, "Ships… unfinished ships…"

"More! Here, on the planet!"

"Waira's Sheaf… center… with the Sphere… and other centers… Foyn's and Yass's…"

"Where are they? I want precise directions!"

"Waira's Sheaf… near the M'ar'nehadi Sea… beyond the water falling from the mountains… Yass's Sheaf… on the southern seashore… in the canyon under force domes… Foyn's Sheaf… another landmass… beyond the ocean… on the plateau with the htaa trees…"

He seemed to be pushing out the words, intermixing them with gurgling wheezes; it was as if invisible hands were squeezing the Keeper's neck, pressing on his throat, not letting him breathe. Siebel worriedly shifted and started to get up, muttering.

"What the hell… What's happening to him?.. Paul, go easy on him… don't press… I think he's resisting… He really is a tough one…"

Whatever was happening, they needed to hurry, Corcoran decided. This thought had entrenched itself in his mind, even though its source was unclear; maybe a thin stream of thoughts was coming to him from the Keeper, causing unease. Peering into the captive's face, which looked deathly blue, he spoke, "Where are the quasi-sentients you're programming? The pair meant for the ships? Where are they?"

Screaming and wheezing were his only replies. Dyte reeled, raised his hands to his throat, as if trying to rip a rope choking him, and collapsed on the floor. His body arched in convulsion, his legs jerking, his tongue came out of his open mouth; he seemed to be trying to inhale, but something was stopping him, not letting in a single breath of air. Corcoran and Siebel bent over him; Klaus's face, usually focused and calm, was now a mask of confusion.

"Damn! He managed to reach his respiratory center… Incredible! A complete block, and nothing can be done about that!"

"No need to do anything," Corcoran said. "It's the best option for him. I wouldn't have let him go anyway."

Siebel's eyebrows shot up.

"Because of your mother? Because of her rape at their hands?"

"Not only. For many reasons."

Dyte jerked one last time and stopped. The blue shade left his cheeks, and now the Keeper's face seemed carved from a snow-white piece of marble, on which someone threw a red rag of the tongue. _A terrible way to go_, Corcoran thought, _but you chose it yourself. You would not have spared me. Neither me nor Klaus._

He straightened up, feeling weariness come over him. Strange, but the sensation was pleasant, confirming that he was a man from Earth, not a Faata, and, therefore, required rest. Whatever he had inherited from Dyte, that did not affect his physiology: his need for sleep was normal, and he had never experienced the cyclical arousal connected with tuahha. His brain was another matter… It was, of course, different from others; had he been like everyone else, Dyte would have been unable to take control over his mind, as psychic links did not work between humans and Faata. But, as it turned out, Corcoran could hear both, which gave him the right to call himself a lucky mutation.

His brain really was special… Would he pass on his gifts to Nadya and Lyuba?.. His heart ached and the Keeper's dead face blurred before his eyes at the thought of his daughters. _You're their grandfather!_ He thought and immediately added. _May the Creator protect them from such a grandfather…_

He nodded to Siebel, "Let's grab him, Klaus. You get his legs, and I'll take his shoulders."

They dragged Dyte into the t'hami chamber and put him on the antigravity disk. Then Siebel visited the alcove, put away his hypnoglyph, and started to examine the crystals, shimmering against the dark walls. He chose one, stuck his hand right into the pale glow, froze for a moment, squinted, and spoke.

"It appears to be a contact substance, a bio-device like a stationary kaff… For a more intimate interaction with the local brain, and, through it, with any local addressee… Well, we don't need this now." He pulled out his hand, brushed off his fingers in disgust, and looked at Corcoran. "You don't look well, Paul. Tired?"

"Yeah. I need sleep," he said with a frown. "It was a tough landing, and I got my brains wrung out… plus two doses of formerite… [_Formerite is a tranquilizer and an antidepressant; used to quickly remove pain symptoms and restore normal condition._] you know the reaction after that… Exhausted. I'm not a Faata or a Metamorph, after all."

"We're no strangers to some human things either," Siebel noted and stretched out on the floor. "Lie down, sleep, and I'll have a talk with the local quasi-mind. You could say we're fast friends… A tiny and stupid beastie, but funny. Lie down, rest!"

Corcoran followed his advice and fell asleep almost immediately. This time, he saw the same vision as the last Dream: the dark boulder of Obscurus with the bubble of the force field, cruisers in battle formation, his frigate, and half-a-dozen warm living flames under the ceramic armor. He also saw that caravan heading from Ro'on to T'har or, perhaps, to the outer planet, a hundred angular modules, looking like ancient jerricans. They split into several groups and altered course; it seemed they were not going to T'har, after all, but patrolling space near Ro'on. Battle modules, not transport ships: smaller, with annihilator barrels sticking out below the pilot's cabin.

_That's a bad sign!_ Corcoran thought, and the Keeper's words immediately came back to him, "The Pillars of Order will not talk to Bino Tegari! None of them! Only destroy!"

He woke up five and a half hours later, alarmed but rested. Klaus Siebel was sitting cross-legged near him, and shadows moved on the elderly Faata's face. The transparent substance in the deep alcove in front of him kept flaring and dimming, and two long, thin tentacles stretched from it to Siebel's temples. He faintly rocked in synch with the flashes of light.

"Were you able to find anything out?" Corcoran asked, rubbing his stiff neck.

"Yes. Many interesting things, but nothing of substance. No strategic information, more about the t'ho, their upbringing and life. You see, this is a regional brain: it controls the factory, the local incubator, and the automated systems in the Faata dwellings. It's barely even sentient."

Corcoran squatted several times.

"We should eat, Klaus, and go."

"If you wish, we can try some local dishes. I can order the quasi-sentient."

"Let's not experiment. I'm perfectly fine with food pills."

The outgrowths, connecting Siebel with the device in the alcove, twitched and disappeared in the transparent substance, the light stopped blinking. Corcoran took out a cylindrical container from his backpack, clicked a lever: four pills dropped into his palm, two for each of them. They were supposed to flush them down with a gulp of water. The whole feast took no more than five seconds.

"Bad news," Corcoran spoke. "If the Dreams are true, then the Faata are combing through the nearby space. I've seen the battle modules… let's hope they don't run into the frigate… Praagh can't leave quickly from here; it's too risky to jump into Limbo with the planet nearby."

"They won't leave without us," Siebel answered with a worried look.

"Even more reasons to finish up our business here quickly. We already know the most important thing." Corcoran glanced at the t'hami chamber, where the Keeper's body was lying. "Well, the Commodore has figured out without our help that the shipyard is the most important target here. He'll be attacking Obscurus within a few hours."

"Is that from the Dreams too?"

"Of course. I can't reach that far while awake. Strange, right?"

"Nothing strange here. When you're asleep, your mind is calm, nothing is distracting you. Relaxation and, at the same time, the moment of maximum concentration… You'll learn this. It worked near Obscurus!"

"I'll learn," Corcoran repeated. "When?"

"In time, my friend, in time." Putting a hand on his shoulder, Siebel asked. "Are we going to the coast now? I saw large domes on the seashore, a stone structure, and impassable jungles, but didn't have time to pick out the details, we were flying too fast. But I think that the quasi-sentients are there, near the straight. By the M'ar'nehadi Sea, as the Keeper called it."

_M'ar'nehadi… "Narrow Water" in Faata'liu… They could've come up with a more poetic name_, Corcoran thought. But poetry, like music, painting, and other forms of art, were unknown to the civilization of the Third Phase, too rational and rejecting of the little things dear to the heart. _It's okay, though_, he thought, _settlers from Earth will call everything differently, with the names of ancient gods and demons, heroes and prophets. Especially if the Indians and the Brazilians end up here… Ro'on is a hot planet, just right for them…_

Keeper Dyte's gloomy abode disappeared, light flared into his eyes, his lungs filling with a warm, humid air. They were standing in the jungle, seemingly supporting the thought about a world suitable for the Indians and the Brazilians. This was where thick trees with a grey, brown, and white canopies stretched upwards, a carpet of decaying leaves under their feet, man-sized moss with whisks of tiny flowers, some spherical plants threatening with their thorns, overgrown cacti, but of a poisonous blue hue rather than green. They didn't see any birds, but each of the giant trees buzzed and rang: swarms of winged insects circled the meaty leaves and fruits, hanging in large bunches or lying on the ground. The trees did not grow densely, and the violet sky with the clouds floating north and the dimming stars could be seen in the breaks between the crowns. The sun was not visible; it was early morning, and the luminary's enormous disk had only just lifted over the southern sea.

"Three-four kilometers to the shore," Siebel said, looking around. "I guess I didn't quite reach the target. Well, let me fix that. We'll jump closer to those domes."

"Hold on. There's something shimmering… Do you see?" Corcoran stretched out his hand. "We should take a look. The shining is definitely artificial."

Trampling the leaves and the overripe fruit into the soil, they headed towards the glow shining between the trees. The forest appeared to be wild: there were no trails, no one was foraging, and the tree trunks had no notches or any other marks. The thickets of moss, or something like moss, stood like a wall here and there, the sturdy stalks bent under their feet and immediately straightened out, trying to whip them in the face, and Corcoran let loose with his laser discharger. The flaming beam disturbed the creatures nesting in the moss; snake-like bodies, covered in fur or feathers, slithered away in panic, there was an unpleasant gnashing sound, and the animals disappeared.

There was a bare strip of earth beyond the trees and the moss, stretching in both directions, as far as the eye could see. Then the jungle started again, and, to get there, all they had to do was take thirty or thirty-five steps, if not for something transparent but visible in the sunlight shimmering in the middle of the strip; it was a curtain, seemingly woven from jets of water and flashes of lightning.

They froze between two white-barked trees and stared at this obstacle.

"A force barrier," Siebel said finally.

"That's the one," Corcoran confirmed.

"About ten meters in height, and I can see something blue to the south. Looks like the sea."

"Probably. Can you feel the salty wind? Could they have fenced off the territory with the quasi-sentients?"

"I doubt it, Paul. Then the barrier would have been going along the shore or curved, and we don't see a curve."

"We don't," Corcoran agreed. "But they did cordon off something! A large section of the jungle, if we judge by this fence. Why?"

"Why, why," Siebel grumbled. "It's a humanoid tradition! You like surrounding everything with walls: your home, your garden, your city, even the places where you sleep and eat. That's your social instinct: what's fenced off is mine."

"When we get home, I'll do something nice for you: I'll take down the fence around our garden," Corcoran promised.

They chuckled at one another, spent some time in silence, then Siebel spoke.

"You know what I think when I see such a cordon? Am I on the right side? After all, the function of a fence is to separate one thing from another, yours from someone else's, dangerous from safe. What do you think, Paul, have we invaded–"

The stalks behind them rustled and clicked, Corcoran spun around, threw up the arm with the discharger, and cut down an enormous black monstrosity in mid-leap. The monster's two bleeding halves dropped at Siebel's feet, and he was dumbfounded for a second. That could have cost them their lives: another creature jumped out of the thicket right at Corcoran, followed by two more, three others dashed towards Siebel from behind the tree trunks, and five or six suddenly appeared on the bare strip, as if materializing out of thin air. It was a pack of fierce hunters, moving fast and nearly-silently and, apparently, not lacking in common sense. At the very least, they knew how to surround their prey and attack suddenly, from all sides.

The fiery beam shredded the nearest beast, but there was no doubt that they would be unable to kill the whole pack. They didn't act like terrestrial predators, did not bare their teeth threateningly, did not growl and, probably, had no fear of weapons or people, and the bodies of their fellow pack members did not deter them either. They did not hesitate, all of them leapt together, and Corcoran realized that only his plasma thrower could stop them. But he did not have time to reach for it.

For a moment, as imperceptible as a flight through the Limbo, an image appeared in his mind: two people in a forest clearing and a dozen black creatures, frozen in mid-leap. Powerful, flexible bodies, long dragon-like necks, clawed feet, and alligator jaws… A heartbeat, a push of blood in the temples, the cold feeling in the chest, and their view changed; they were standing on the other side of the barrier and were looking at the predators through the force curtain. The pack fell apart; some rushed towards their dead and started to gnaw at them, others were pacing by the barrier, not getting closer though, and looked at the people with a carnivorous expectation. Large animals, bigger than lions and tigers, Corcoran decided and wiped cold sweat from his forehead.

"I couldn't hear them!" Siebel spoke with a guilty expression. "It's never easy with animals… different mental frequencies, different psyche, different everything… Besides, it's harder to work with an undeveloped brain. I don't think I could've stopped them."

"They're p'hots," Corcoran explained. "Litvin killed one such beast on the Faata ship. He told me."

"P'hots…" Siebel's head swayed, once, twice, three times; he seemed to be thinking about something. "P'hots… Vicious predatory creatures, and their hatchery is behind the barrier… That means we're on the right side now."

"So, have you changed your mind about fences and walls?"

"Doubt it, Paul. I'm not a human, after all, even if only in the matter of personal transportation. For me, a free child of the ether, fences and walls are the height of absurdity."

Corcoran smiled, removing the tension. Then he said, "A child of the ether could have been lunch just now."

"Well, maybe a little bit, a chunk of flesh here, a chunk there… Then again, perhaps I'm missing a useful chance of saying goodbye to Klaus Siebel. Imagine what you'd write in your report: USF Secret Service officer Siebel was ripped apart and eaten by wild p'hots. No body parts were found; see the attached blood-stained boots and jumpsuit clasp."

"I can write a report like that right now," Corcoran noted. "And then what?"

"Then I'd find a way to get back to Earth. Change my face and come to Selina as a handsome young man. And we'd live together to ripe old age…"

"You're naïve, Klaus, even though you're long-lived. If she loves you, then it must be the way you are now; she won't accept another."

"Here, my friend, is where you're dead wrong. A creature like me knows how ephemeral appearances are and, at the same time, how important they are for you humanoids. Especially for a woman. Especially in a man she loves. Especially if his essence hasn't changed, but his appearance now matches it. It's so beautiful, Paul, the harmony between essence and appearance!"

One of the p'hots, enraged at the sight of its prey, did jump at the force screen and was immediately thrown back, rolling on the ground, clawing at it. The claws were frightening, at least finger-length.

"What about me?" Corcoran inquired. "Does my appearance harmonize with my essence?"

"Absolutely, if a beautiful woman like Vera loves you. You're lucky, Paul, for you've been surrounded by love since you were little. There was so much of it that, I think, there would be enough left for me…"

_Poor, poor man_, Corcoran thought. _A miserable exile, who had come to Earth during the Dark Ages and lived through them in grief and loneliness… But times are different now. Now, you can say who you are and where you're from, and you won't be taken as a devil-worshiper, or a sorcerer, or a madman. Maybe someone would want to use you for self-interest, but they won't be surprised by your talents, for we already know that the galaxy is full of wonders, the primary of them being life. Not like on Earth, but life nonetheless!_

He glanced at the p'hots, raging beyond the ghostly wall, and said, "We'll speak of love another time. Let's go, Klaus!"

The world trembled and then stabilized once again. They found themselves on a long, high terrace made of processed and fitted slabs of granite. The terrace ran along the shore, and green trees were visible on one side and the shining blue sea on the other. The forest reached the coastal range and looked like ancient Chinese drawings: smoothed outlines of the mountains, soft pastel colors, a certain mystery of the landscape, giving freedom to the observer's imagination. The sea, the magnificent cloud masses, and the rising sun seemed just as mysterious, but an industrial detail ruined the effect: two bluish domes, sticking out above the terrace like two halves of an enormous egg. They connected at the base, and there, like a pale round moon, was a shimmering entrance membrane.

"They're here," Siebel spoke. "Just a pair of quasi-minds and no one else. It doesn't seem like our late friend Dyte needed any assistants. Can you hear them?"

The sensation was completely different from that brief moment when Corcoran had touched the brain on Obscurus. That creature, or the Daskin beastie, as Siebel had called it, seemed not only enormous, but mature, powerful, imbued with many individualities, obviously connected to the t'ho and the Faata, who were working at the shipyard. The quasi-sentients under the domes seemed more like sleeping giant animals, like dormant pythons digesting their food in peace and quiet; they didn't seem to possess an intelligence, and their memories were transparent and almost empty. They appeared to be at the stage closest to the original purpose they were used for by the Daskins: living devices for amplifying emotions and transmitting them telepathically. No one in the galaxy knew why the Ancients had needed them; it was possible that they had lost their ability to feel and were trying to compensate.

Corcoran left the mental space, returning to the world of roaring waves and violet skies.

"They need to be destroyed, Klaus. We won't touch the other, smaller brains, until the evacuation is complete, but these need to be destroyed. They're too large and unpredictable… like monstrous snakes, not yet aware of their own strength."

"Like the Midgard Serpent… [_The Midgard Serpent, or Jörmungandr, was a monstrous serpent that is, according to Scandinavian mythology, squeezing the entire inhabited world, Midgard, in its coil._]" Siebel muttered. "Well then, I agree with you, we need to destroy them. These Daskin toys are too dangerous. Until the Faata had found them, there was another option for their development, other methods for preventing a disaster. Perhaps t'ho would have been people, not mere appendages to thinking machines."

Nodding silently, Corcoran looked at the sea, seething at the foot of the domes, then at the jungle approaching the terrace as a string of frozen dark green waves. If one didn't look at the domes, then the view was completely primeval.

"No motorways, not even trails… no roads for ground transportation… Strange, Klaus."

"I don't think so. They don't have wheeled or tracked vehicles. As for machines with gravity drives, they don't need roads. They can take off and land anywhere, even on this terrace."

"That's probably what it's for," Corcoran agreed. "Can you transport us inside, Klaus? Or will we have to deactivate the membrane?"

"I will try. It's more reliable when I can picture the target location. In this case, a domed ceiling, a smooth floor, canals with flowing water, and a pair of brown beasties… That's enough information."

"Why do they need water?" Corcoran asked.

"It carries nutrients. Various small organic matter, salts, metals, silicon, oxygen, hydrogen… Everything they need to grow."

The world blinked once again, opening invisible doors into an enormous space that seemed empty at first glance. Everything was exactly as expected: a blue ceiling a hundred meters high, a floor with stone tiles, two wide openings in the walls, through which the noisy and rumbling seawater flowed in. From where they were standing, Corcoran could see the edges of circular pools, each under a separate dome, and the elevation between them, a transparent platform on a gravlift column. Pulling out his weapon and nodding to Siebel, he moved towards it.

The platform was, probably, the Keeper's work area; both pools were visible from the top, with enormous brown carcasses on the bottom. Two motionless disk-shaped bodies forty meters in diameter, having yet to grow any tentacles; the seething and bubbling water washed them, and the beasties seemed even larger through its transparent lens. The air under the domes was stuffy and humid.

Corcoran raised his plasma thrower.

"They are not aware of our presence," Siebel said.

"Did you put up a barrier?"

"Yes. But I won't be able to hold it when you kill the first one. The second one will feel it… The reaction will be strong, Paul."

"How strong?" Corcoran wondered, shifting the power regulator to maximum. The PT-44 emitter he was holding was a deadly weapon, capable of blowing up a mountain or boiling a small lake.

"I don't know. Very strong… maybe even monstrous… I'll try to weaken it, but prepare yourself for the worst."

"I'm ready."

He raised the thrower and fired. Clouds of steam rose over the right pool, its edge melted and flowed to the bottom as a liquid mass, the water-supplying canal became shallow, and a flaming ball rolled down its length, melting new flows of water. He felt the heat on his face, wet haze covered the dome, not letting him see what was happening in the pool. Then again, there was no need: he could see a glowing plasma cloud at the point of impact with the temperature of a solar corona. Small but hot, like a camp fire in hell.

Wiping his watery eyes and covering his face with his hand, Corcoran turned to the left pool. One of the beasties had been vaporized along with the water and the plastic covering, but the other one remained, who now knew what awaited it. He was prepared for a psychic attack, an attempt to penetrate his mind, stop his heart, destroy his blood vessels, something similar to what the Keeper had been planning on doing to him, but, to his surprise, he felt nothing. For now.

"Quickly…" Siebel muttered behind him, "quickly… I can't hold it anymore…"

Something cracked silently, or, perhaps, the invisible line connecting Klaus and Corcoran broke. He didn't have time to touch the trigger; fear flooded his mind, universal dread before the darkness of nothingness, the disappearing forever. The emotion was inhuman, belonging to a creature aware of itself no more than a wild animal, but even an animal that didn't understand death could fear it. The desire to live, an unconscious instinct, amplified a thousandfold, forced Corcoran to bend over and go numb; he was barely able to hold on to the plasma thrower. The fear fell upon him, but there was something else in this vague feeling, something beyond an animal's dread: a plea?.. a plea for mercy?.. a temptation?.. a promise of everything he would get, if he became a symbiote of this strange creature?..

"Shoot!" Siebel croaked hoarsely. "Destroy it, or we're done for! This damned thing will drive us insane!"

Overcoming the mortal anguish and dread coming from the pool. Corcoran raised the emitter. It seemed to him as if he was aiming at Mother or Vera, maybe even both of them, and, if he pulled the trigger, then the most dear thing to him would die, turning into a cloud of plasma. Not only Mother and Vera, but also Nadya and Lyuba, and their home in Smolensk, and the whole city, and the entire planet along with the Solar System…

_Drivel_, he told himself, _a daze, a mirage! You went overboard, pal!_

Scorching lightning burst out of the barrel, new clouds of steam clouded the dome, and the fear left him. This happened so suddenly, so unexpectedly, that Corcoran barely managed to stay on his feet; his knees gave way, and he lowered himself to the platform. Siebel gave a sigh of relief.

"It's too bad I don't have a sigga… But you, Paul, have done just as well."

"It wanted to offer something," Corcoran muttered, gripping the thrower with both hands. "Maybe promote me to admiral, or give me a Swiss bank account, or make me ruler of the world… And threatened! The bastard threatened me! It threatened to destroy Earth or, at least, my family! No, that's not it… That I would destroy them myself…"

"I did say it was a dangerous toy, not for humanoids." Siebel's eyes clouded, as if he was listening to something again. "You can be tricked so easily, or bribed, or pushed into confrontation… I think it's because you feel your individuality with a particular acuteness. That's both your strength and your weakness. Yes, you're capable of great acts… But each of you is a closed world, where almost no other person can go, and that's why–"

"Even a loved one?" Corcoran interrupted him, getting up.

"That's why I said 'almost'. But how many loved ones are there? Three-four, if someone gets lucky, like you. As for the rest… the rest, like me, are doomed to solitude."

"You were talking about something else not long ago." Corcoran steadied himself on his feet, stuck the emitter in his belt, and examined both pools, or, rather, what was left of them, in satisfaction. Water had already filled in the blackened holes with charred edges and flowed on the floor; the drains were probably clogged. "You said that I was lucky, for I've been surrounded by love since I was little. But who gives it, Klaus? Who gives that love if not one's loved ones?"

"That's true, but…" Siebel started, but his face suddenly changed, the features of an elderly Faata flowed like melted wax, he threw his head back to look at the dome covered by the fog. He clenched his fists, held them to his chest, and went silent.

"What?" Corcoran asked. "What happened, Klaus?"

"The battle modules… the ones you saw in your Dream… they've found the frigate… our people are defending, but there are many attackers, too many… Selina… Selina!"


	10. Chapter 9

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (__Ответный__удар__) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Chapter 9**

**Space near the outer planet and other places**

The admiral's compartment aboard the _Europe_ was big and, besides living quarters, included a spacious office for meeting, rest, and friendly visits. Such luxuries were not present on the other cruisers, as they were regular combat units, while the _Europe_, the lead ship of her class, had been built as a flagship. It was planned that Commodore Pavel Litvin would sit in the office and command the counterstrike flotilla… But Pavel Litvin had not lived to see the start of the operation, and the presiding chairman's seat at the round table now belonged to another man, tall, lean, with a commodore's chevrons on his uniform. Karel Vrba was nothing like Litvin in terms of appearance or disposition, but there was something they both had in common: each of them had a personal score to settle with the Faata.

An unsealed package and a thin pile of documents lay in front of Commodore Vrba. This fact in and of itself was surprising, for, in this day and age, neither paper nor plastic, or even any other material that could be used for writing was virtually ever used. Chips, pocketputes, and film screens had replaced the ancient books, and even artists no longer painted on paper or canvas but using computers and holoprojectors. But Vrba extracted sheets of paper from the package, filled with large printed text, and each page was signed three times: by the First and Second Speakers of the World Parliament and by Admiral Yumashev, the CINC of the Third Fleet. The thick yellowish paper, the dark lines of letters, the signatures, and the control strip certifying their authenticity – all that gave the document an archaic look, as if the Commodore was looking at an Ancient Egyptian papyrus.

The five other chairs at the table were occupied by captains. Not in the flesh, of course: Task Force 37, having left the Oort cloud, was moving in battle formation towards the outer planet, and the captains were on their bridges, at their battle posts. The formation was tight, the signal delay was no more than a few microseconds, and the holograms looked extremely real. To the right of Vrba was Commodore Rustem Adisherov, his first deputy and the captain of the _Asia_, to the left was his second deputy James Douglas Clayton, the captain of the _America_. The _Africa_, the _Antarctica_, and the _Australia_ were represented by Bruce Kalinga, Yuri Shavrin, and Paul Burg.

"You've familiarized yourselves with the three messages received from the _Litvin_," Commodore Vrba said. "The first two pertain to the shipyard, while the last one is an overview of the situation on Ro'on, where our scouts are currently located. Does everyone agree that the shipyard and Obscurus are our primary targets?"

The heads of those sitting at the table nodded in unison. All of them were USF veterans, having lived to get their captain's chevrons, something not everyone managed to do, and all of them knew the delicate art of seeking out vulnerabilities in the enemy's defenses. _The light of Earth's Star Fleet_, Karel Vrba thought with pride.

"If there are no other opinions, then let's start planning the operation. Burg, if you please."

Paul Burg, Martian by birth from the Little Queensland Dome, was the most junior in the council of captains. Usually, this was seen as a mere formality related to the ships' numbers, with the exception of two cases: first, the members of the council spoke by seniority, and second, should Task Force 37 be destroyed, the _Australia_ had to make it back to Earth. Its computers held the same information as the flagship's, the copies of all orders, briefings and dispatches, memorandums and reports of the scientific section, and the video recordings made by the SADs and the observers.

"We can't get tied up in a protracted battle with an uncertain outcome," Burg said. "Based on Corcoran's data, one of the starships in the shipyard is already equipped, and it has a quasi-mind… If you recall, the ship that attacked Earth carried nearly fifteen hundred battle units. There may be at least as many, or even more, here, against six of our cruisers and six hundred Peregrines. It's difficult to forecast the outcome."

"Yes, with such a balance of forces, the forecast is problematic," Vrba agreed. "Your opinion, Shavrin."

"A surprise attack, Commodore. After the Invasion, we know the parameters of their defense fields. It won't hold up under a strike of three cruiser-based annihilators. We can slice it open, burn the ships, and their means of defense. If we act quickly, they won't have time to deploy their module flotillas."

"Kalinga?"

"Shavrin is correct: surprise is the best strategy. Perhaps we won't be able to destroy all the modules with a massive strike, but we have good odds against even a thousand of them. We only have six hundred Peregrines, but let's not forget cruiser support. Besides, we can drop combat robots onto the shipyard, followed by marines."

"Clayton, you have the floor."

The captain of the _America_ was relatively young, but he had managed to become famous as a brilliant tactician and strategist. He had a special gift that turned a soldier into a commander: never forget about one's own advantages over the enemy, even the most insignificant and minor, and use them with the skill of an experienced magician. He was predicted a distinguished career, if he returned alive from the New Worlds, of course.

"Maybe we will deal with their defenses," he spoke, looking at the monitor showing the slowly-rotating rock of Obscurus. "We now have defense fields, annihilators, and gravity drives of our own, so our maneuverability and firepower are equal to the enemy. Maybe we will succeed, but we'll still sustain casualties. The attack will bleed us dry, and there are still two more planets… two worlds in this system and Aezat at Beta Malleus."

"What do you suggest?"

"Let's bet on our advantage. Not on surprise, although that is also important, but on the contour drive. Faata battle modules can only move through normal space, just like our fighters, while the cruisers are capable of submerging into Limbo. This will allow us to maneuver quickly."

"But not near the outer planet," Shavrin objected. "Such an enormous gravitating mass will not allow–"

"Yes, of course! But what conclusion do we derive from this?" Clayton's face, the face of a cunning farmer from Oklahoma, wrinkled into a smile. "Only one, Yuri, only one! We must lure them out to such a distance, where we can jump into Limbo and reappear at an unexpected place. By my navigators' calculations, about a hundred thousand megameters from the planet. There is a risk, but it's possible."

"A big risk…" Kalinga muttered. "A hundred thousand megameters… only a day's flight by cruiser… A jump like that could take us to the center of the galaxy."

"Doubtful. The uncertainty isn't that great, and we won't get farther than the Oort cloud. Naturally, the target location will be blurred, but we will stay within the system's boundaries. The main thing is not to get close to the sun. If the armor melts…"

"…then we're dead," Paul Burg noted. "Have you calculated the probability of such an outcome, James?"

"About one-hundredth. I think those are good odds."

Vrba rapped on the table with his knuckles.

"We have transitioned to the discussion too soon, having never heard from Adisherov. Please, Rustem."

"A jump in the vicinity of the protostar will scatter us throughout the whole system. The risk to get close to the star might be minimal, but we'll definitely lose communication. It's impossible to establish the ships' positions ahead of time, and if someone gets thrown into the cloud, they'll need a day, maybe even two, to get back into reliable communication range. And a lot longer to gather the flotilla for a second attack on Obscurus."

"Then we need to split up," the Commodore responded. His gaze slid to the thin pile of sheets at his elbow, and, covering them with a palm, he spoke. "Here are the Parliament's instructions, and, in accordance with them, I have to reject a sudden frontal assault. Specifically, not the attack itself, but its consequences, the destruction of the ships. That is unacceptable."

"Why, sir?" Shavrin asked, frowning.

"We know the population density on T'har: two thousand fully sentient beings and three and a half million t'ho… that is from the data obtained from the Faata female, the one that… hmm… the one who stayed with Commodore Litvin. Aezat has, possibly, as many inhabitants as T'har or less, while Ro'on has more by an order of magnitude. Forty million inhabitants in total." Vrba's face was inscrutable. "And what are we going to do with them?"

"Forty million…" Shavrin grumbled. "About the same as how many they've killed on Earth…"

"Yes. However," the Commodore gave him a hard look, "however, there are nuances, Captain. We cannot and do not wish to become like the Faata. If I gave you an order to head to Ro'on and cleanse it… say, release a cloud of virulent microorganisms, burn the settlements with plasma weapons, cut the planet's crust open with an annihilator… would you have followed such an order?"

Brown spots appeared on Shavrin's cheeks. Recovering, he spoke, after a moment's pause.  
"I will follow any order you give me, Commodore, and so will my people. Half of them have loved ones who died… parents, the older generation… like…"

"… like me," Vrba finished imperturbably. "There's a good saying: before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves." He smiled grimly. "We can, of course, destroy ten million sentient beings, even twenty, or forty… we have the means… But how do we live after that? How do we live?.." The yellow sheets rustled under his hand. "Luckily, the instructions I have received do not require genocide. We, the humanity, are entering into a family of galactic races, and many in this disjointed group will look at us in askance and judge us unfairly, such as one judges a bastard child who has come out of the woodwork to demand a piece of the inheritance. The murder of millions of aliens would not make us look any better. We must exile them from here, not destroy. Accounting for the Invasion, this is a just measure, and, besides, Beta and Gamma Malleus are within our sphere of galactic interest. These systems are much closer to Earth than to the Faata empire."

"Exile…" Shavrin repeated, shaking his head. "Now I understand… For them to get out of there, they need ships. But even a hundred of their enormous ships won't fit forty million! And all they, effectively, have is one, the one with the quasi-mind… This doesn't solve the problem. Am I right, Commodore?"

Vrba and Adisherov exchanged looks. The first deputy was probably familiar with the Parliament's directives, as he answered immediately and without hesitation.

"Based on various estimates, the Invasion ship had from a hundred to a hundred and twenty thousand Faata and t'ho. This means that the higher caste from Aezat, T'har, and Ro'on can leave, taking thousands of servants with them. As for the others, they can send unarmed ships after them, which we will not hinder. Let them take all forty million, if they can do it in time."

"In time?" Kalinga echoed. "Why would time matter?"

"Because a t'ho's lifespan is limited," Adisherov explaind. "We will destroy the incubators and busy the workers, guards, and other caste with something, but they will die quickly without the Faata. The experts think they'll have maybe five-eight years. It's not in our power to grant them a longer life. Either they will be taken, or…" He shrugged.

Silence fell. The five holograms in the office and the office's living owner were motionless, thinking over what they had just heard. Their ships, covered by a force field veil, were flying towards the outer planet, and the crews, ready for battle, were at their posts on the main and auxiliary bridges, at the communication, live support, targeting systems, in the predatory darts of the Peregrines, and the SAD controls, and the bulky carcasses of the combat robots. Gunners, marines, pilots, navigators… Most of them were young and did not remember the horrors of the Invasion, born after it, but having lost loved ones… Or having lost nothing: not their home, not their yard, not their relatives, but that changed nothing; here, from an alien world, immeasurably far from Earth, any loss felt personal.

The Commodore broke the long silence.

"On to business, people! Now, our mission: capture the shipyard, destroy the military equipment, but preserve the ships, at least one of them. Then try to enter negotiations."

"Is that realistic?" Kalinga questioned, and Shavrin raised a silent eyebrow. "Will they want to speak with us?"

"They will. If there are no other ships in the system, then we are in charge. We'll give them a disarmed starship, and let them go. We don't have to like them, we can hate them, but we can't deny their logic and clarity of thought." The Commodore gathered the sheets of the instructions, put them back into the package, and added. "It would be nice to avoid casualties, not counting the initial clash, of course. We'll plan it on the basis of Clayton's idea. Surprise, the contour drive, and a little bit of cunning… We have much to think about!"

The discussion continued for about two hours, then the holograms dissolved in the air, one after another. The dark-skinned Bruce Kalinga, born in the half-destroyed London, vanished; the face and figure of Adisher, who had personally seen his native Tashkent turned into ruins, went away; Shavrin dissolved, his village in Pskov Oblast having survived, but the white stone temples, the pride of Pskov, were gone; the image of Clayton disappeared, his hometown of Muskogee, Oklahoma, so far removed from world events that, having heard of the Invasion, its people had not believed a word of it. The last to dissolve was Paul Burg, who had said no more than a dozen phrases throughout the whole meeting; like all those born on Mars, he instinctively used air sparingly and was, therefore, taciturn.

Having been left alone, Commodore Vrba tiredly rubbed his temples, then entered an air conditioning code on his bracelet, leaned back in his chair, and closed his eyes. The office was filled with the scent of fresh water and blossoming lilac, there was a faint sound of rustling leaves, and his features softened. He imagined himself sitting in the spring gardens of the Prague Castle, over the wide quiet Vltava, and, behind him, rose the gothic spires of the St. Vitus Cathedral, and below was the river with the piers, quays, bridges, and Charles Bridge, the oldest of them, threatening the skies with a pair of guard towers.

_How beautiful!_ he thought. _How beautiful it all was, when the cathedral and the bridge still stood, and those gardens bloomed over the Vltava, which no one will ever see again…_

Red Alert was sounded at 1625. Right after that, the _Asia_, the _Africa_, and the _Antarctica_, diving out from behind the sphere of the protostar and maintaining cruising speed, passed over Obscurus, pouring scorching plasma over the triangular plain with the spot of the force field. It had been assumed that launch tubes came out to the surface of the satellite, and if they were blocked by melted rock, some of the modules would be trapped. The fiery storm still raged among the cliffs and the rocks, turning them into liquid lava, when hatches opened in the ships' sides, spitting fighters out into space. The cruisers, reducing their speed, were on their way to the northern pole, having passed over the cloudy planetary sphere as enormous silver shells. The Peregrines spread out two hundred kilometers away from Obscurus, not trying to attack: their weapons were not strong enough to crack open the force dome. They were circling in space, making sharp course corrections, like flies dancing on a dark tropical night. They were waiting.

Commodore Vrba was watching these maneuvers via relays. Three of his ships were positioned at the planetary disk, hiding in the upper atmosphere, slowly drifting in the protostar's hydrogen corona, above the methane clouds. It was not an easy task for the pilots to maintain such a low orbit near a gravitating mass, but there was no shortage of energy, as hydrogen was an excellent fuel source for gravity drives. The _Europe_, the _America_, and the _Australia_ were swimming like whales among the nutritious plankton, grabbing the gas with the open maws of the converters.

Suddenly, there was smoke coming from the surface of Obscurus. The cooling lava cracked, the dust, crushed stone, and large chunks of rock flew up, heading into the cosmic emptiness, and, along with them, an armada of battle modules was surfacing. A portion of them may have been destroyed during the initial attack, but the survivors seemed to be an innumerable force that was coming up, wave after wave, in the clouds of dust and glowing gas. There was a momentary silence on the _Europe_'s bridge, which was so recently full of people's voices; pilots, navigators, Vrba's officers, and he himself were staring at the central screen. The computer that was receiving information from SAD sensors, was counting the enemy forces, throwing numbers onto the monitor; they were changing with a maddening speed, then their run slowed and, finally, stopped.

"Twelve hundred and forty machines," the officer of the watch reported.

Vrba, gripped by a cocoon, could only nod. Not as few as they had hoped, but not that many either… Four to one, which meant that there would be losses in a direct confrontation… The losses were inevitable in any case, and he tried not to think about that.

"Their movement is disorderly," came the voice of First Officer Leonides.

The Commodore remained silent, but this time, his lips quivered in a smile. Disorderly! Well, not entirely, but, still, it did not seem like the ships were being directed by someone's singular and firm will. Based on Corcoran's report, there was no Strategist, Guardian of the Heavens, as the Faata called their military commanders, at the shipyard. This meant that the defense was being controlled by a triumvirate: two Keepers and a quasi-mind, joined telepathically. A Strategist would have reacted differently, faster and more decisively, the Commodore thought and immediately threw that thought to the side. Wild guesses, nothing but wild guesses! He had never met the Faata in battle, not their Strategists, not the Keepers, not the Daskin creatures animated by them.

The fighters, circling over the shipyard, opened into a wide ring, letting the first enemy echelon through. Obviously, this maneuver served as a sign of confusion to the controlling brain, as now it seemed to have an opportunity to attack the Peregrines from the front and the rear. But Adisher, Kalinga, and Shavrin's ships had already turned around over the planet's pole and, accelerating, were heading towards Obscurus. They passed over the Faata modules, hitting them with everything that could shoot and kill: plasma cannons and swarms, lasers and missiles; then the darkness was cut up by three blue beams, three columns of light, and several modules, who got caught by the streams of anti-matter, flared and vanished, breaking apart in the clouds of explosions.

The beams converged on the force screen protecting the shipyard. The iridescent bubble swelled up momentarily, opening as a bright fiery fountain; something was tossing and twisting in its blood-red streams, something was burning, throwing off sparks, some scorched structures, like dying stars, flew away into the emptiness, cooling, or crashing down, into the methane clouds, blazing an ominous glow. After a second or two, the fountain popped, and white flakes of frozen air rushed out of the dark hole. The weak light of the floodlights tried to get through the blizzard roaring on the surface of Obscurus.

"I hope they haven't damaged the ships," the Commodore said. "Officer of the watch! Do you see anything?"

"Only dust and snow, sir. I'm afraid, until they settle, the Owls are blind."

"Well then, let's wait."

Vrba looked over the bridge, the seven pilots holding the cruiser in the stormy atmosphere of the protostar, ten navigators, a dozen observers, and his three officers, sitting and the communication and fire control panels. The Commodore's chair, connected to the floor and the bulkhead, covered by a protective transparent housing, was on a dais, and, from here, he could see the wide semicircle of the consoles, hologram cylinders appearing here and there with the dark glyph symbols, the heads and shoulders of the people packed into cocoons, and a row of screens. Some of them were showing shining stars, or grey rivers of clouds streaming over the planet, or an interior of some familiar compartment; the others, linked to the relays, were displaying the snowy fog flowing over the stones of Obscurus, the flashing lightning of the annihilators, and the bursting balls of fire of dying ships. A battle was taking place there: three cruisers, three hundred Peregrines against the Faata armada. The coordination of the enemy fleet did not appear to break; it seemed that the quasi-mind and both of the Keepers had survived the anti-matter explosion.

"Attention!" the Commodore spoke. "Leonides, transmit to the _Asia_: tell them to disengage. Clayton and Burg are to wait!"

A maelstrom of glyphs spun over the transmitter. The three fighting cruisers shifted into the depth of the screens, the dim sparks of the fighters stretching out behind them, attempting to hold off the enemy. _Can they break off?.. and at what cost?.._ the Commodore thought. The Peregrines suddenly separated into three directions, freeing the space; a missile salvo from the cruisers swept away several dozen modules, and the annihilators flashed the final blue lances. The _Asia_, picking up her Peregrines, rushed upwards, coming up above the ecliptic, the _Africa_ turned towards the galactic pole, the _Antarctica_ continued to maintain course towards the Oort cloud. The cruisers' hatches were open, and the Commodore could not help but count the UFs returning to their nests. It was not working very well, as the operation was taking place with commendable speed.

The ships were diverging farther and father, and he thought that, from a human point-of-view, this looked more like a panicked escape. What about the Faata? What would the Faata think? And, most importantly, their controlling brain? Vrba had absolutely no knowledge of the psyche of quasi-sentient beings, and he once again wistfully thought that his position was not his by right. Litvin should have been sitting here, Paul Litvin! The only one who had made contact with a spawn of the Daskins, who could have anticipated its reaction! But Commodore Litvin, as was the star fleet's custom, was on his way to Alpha Centauri, Procyon, or Sirius, packed into a burial container, and an urn with Yo's ashes was cooling on his chest…

Karel Vrba's alarm was in vain: the modules that had risen up from Obscurus, split into three groups and did not appear to be intent on letting their prey go. They were following the cruisers into the cold and the eternal night, distancing themselves from the shipyard with every passing minute, like a pack of wolves following the escaping prey, to catch and destroy it. A futile attempt! But that would not be clear immediately… no, not immediately!

"Kiryanov, contact Adisherov, Kalinga, and Shavrin," the Commodore ordered his second officer. "I am awaiting reports on the losses."

The saddest act in any battle, even a victorious one, he thought. There were no victories without losses… Actually, the only difference between victory and defeat was the number of casualties, one's own and the enemy's.

"Data received," Kiryanov reported. "Should I put it up on the screen?"

"Aloud, Sergey, aloud. Broadcast to all ships."

"The _Asia_ lost an external radar and has a crack in the hull near the fifth cargo hold. Eighteen marines did not return… No damage to the _Africa_, twenty-three Peregrines lost… The _Antarctica_ lost pressure in turret 4B and the adjoining part of the deck, eight dead… and nine marines have not returned… End of the report, Commodore. Standard procedure?"

"Yes."

He forcefully pressed the lever freeing him from the cocoon and stood up. Everyone else on the bridge, in the compartments, and on the decks of the _Europe_ and the other ships rose with him.

"We've lost fifty-eight people," Vrba said and threw his hand up in a salute. "May their ashes wander the Great Emptiness until the end of time, and we, the living, will remember and honor them… The hymn! Kiryanov, list their names!"

_Minor blood_, he thought, listening to the familiar names. _But can blood even be minor?.. Only on paper or microchip, in a triumphant report: the total size of the crews is thirty-two hundred people, the losses were less than two percent… or a little more, if Corcoran and his people don't return… Timokhin lost everyone in the Battle of the Martian Orbit._ Karel Vrba could not recall the exact number, but he never forgot the loss of his father and brother. And when the music and the list had ended, he wanted to head to the defenseless shipyard, drop the biggest charge they had into that damned hole, and then put T'har, Ro'on, and Aezat to the sword and the flame.

Gritting his teeth, he lowered into his seat and spoke evenly.

"Cancel the alert. We'll stay in orbit for twenty hours, until the first group goes into Limbo, then we'll lock down Obscurus. Ibáñez, your specialists and Loudmouth Ben need to be fully prepared. Kiryanov, relieve the watch. All those not on duty, go rest. Leonides, transmit these orders to the _Australia_ and the _America_.

After jumping through Limbo, the _Asia_ found herself near T'har's orbit. The _Africa_ and the _Antarctica_ were lucky: both ships exited into real space not far from one another, halfway to the comet cloud. Their next jump put them in the vicinity of Obscurus, and, after establishing communication, Commodore Vrba ordered them to join the main group. The _Asia_ was sent to T'har, where it would arrive within a day. Vrba believed that, by that point, he would be the master of the New Worlds: T'har and Ro'on were unlikely to be capable of putting up serious resistance, the shipyard's defenses were crushed, and the fleet defending it was stuck in space, many hours away from Obscurus. That fleet, despite the losses it had sustained during the fight with the cruisers and the Peregrines, was still a force to be reckoned with; it still had nearly a thousand modules, and a new battle with the Faata could end either way. Even if it resulted in a crushing victory, the cost would be too great: the computers forecasted the destruction of half or even seventy percent of human ships. But the Faata battle modules, busy chasing ghosts, would not return to the shipyard soon, and the brain controlling them was in the Commodore's grip. Well, not exactly in the grip, but definitely on his palm; all he had to do was squeeze his fingers.

At his command, the three ships surfaced above the hydrogen atmosphere and, circling the protostar—the _Europe_ from the pole, the _America_ and the _Australia_ from both sides of the equator—met above the moon that looked like a roughly-cut tetrahedron. One of the sides was covered in snow, but melted stone, settled cliffs, and a web of cracks were visible through this thin white cover. The bubble of the force field was once again present over the shaft, but its shimmering appeared to be weak, and its shape was unstable: it kept expanding into a hemisphere, or settling almost to the planetoid's surface. Not a defense against weapons; the people in the shipyard were probably trying to preserve what was left of their air.

The _America_ and the _Australia_, surrounded by a swarm of battle-ready Peregrines, hovered about five hundred kilometers above the moon. The _Europe_ came lower, dropping several SADs to scout the area. The force screen, thin and almost transparent, did not prevent them from gauging the state of the shipyard after the annihilator strike. Unlike lasers, swarms, and plasma weapons, which pierced, sliced, or burned, unlike vacuum and freezer bombs, which destroyed air, unlike poison gases, biological weapons, and missiles, the annihilator was a device of a different caliber, more powerful and destructive. A stream of anti-protons did not scatter as much and could travel for tens of thousands of megameters, until it encountered an obstacle; then, according to the formula E=mc2, terrible energy was released. The results were a flash of light, plenty of hard radiation, and superheated plasma, which was all that remained of the matter at the periphery of the stream. The force screen had protected the Faata from this sad fate, but one of the ships looked like a bunch of chaotically-twisted beams, torn surfaces, and drops of solidified metal, and the hull of another was full of gaping holes. The third did not appear to be damaged or could be repaired; multi-armed machines were busy on its nose.

A wing of Peregrines, dropped from the _Europe_, passed over the force bubble, turned around almost near the rocks, and four blue lances, piercing the bloated dome twice, melted the soil beyond it. Then the fighters went up and started to circle over the shaft, occasionally firing their lasers; the beams were being aimed on a tangent, merely grazing the surface of the bubble, with crimson shapeless splotches blooming at the point of contact. Maybe the hint would have been lost on the Silmarri or any other non-humanoids, but the Faata were humanoid, who worked with devices that, if one ignores the quasi-minds, did not differ much from their terrestrial analogs. Your roof was leaking, there was rustling of the laser flashes, and your defenders were far away… We could have vaporized you, you and your priceless ships. But we'll wait, we'll wait! If you want, we'll talk terms, bargain… But not too long!

A module surfaced over the top of the giant cylinder, an unarmed transport vehicle. It smoothly rose to the top of the dome, slipped through the force veil, waited for the Peregrines to surround it, and moved towards the open hatch of the cruiser. It was being received on the lower marine deck, but with honors: Third Officer Raivo Paulinen, two combat robots, and a detachment of soldiers with weapons at the ready.

"One person, sir," Paulinen reported, looking into the module's cabin. "And something else, naked and bony… Wrapped in film and suspended by the forward screen."

Commodore Vrba was on the bridge and was watching the guest's arrival on an internal monitor.

"It's a pilot, Raivo," he said, rising out of his chair. "Don't touch it, let it hang where it is. Bring the Faata to deck A, right to Loudmouth Ben. Officer of the watch!"

"Sir!"

"Send Dr. Ibáñez to me immediately, I'll be in the observation room. Kick the astrophysicists out of there, and put marines on the hatches. Transmit everything to the ships of the flotilla, but only on the captain's channel. Full recording. Let Borsetti handle that, Kiryanov has the conn."

"Aye-aye, sir!"

The officer of the watch dashed to the intercom, but Vrba stopped him.

"Tell the head of the science team that we need a Transinformatics expert. Better get those who programmed the Loudmouth. Dr. Swahn and Dr. Cuba. Get to it!"

He left the control center and leisurely headed down the wide hallway of deck A. As regulations demanded during a Red Alert, there were marines in battle armor under the command of Lieutenant Beloruchko, and one more platoon was located by the hatches leading to the observation room. It had already been cleared out: no one was at the control panels, the telescopic domes were empty, pocketputes, recording chips, holograms with the view of the starry sky bisected by the Void were scattered on the couches and the tables. At the far side of the room, separated by screens, two women, Isabel Cuba and Helga Swahn, were bustling by the Loudmouth's massive hulk. Joaquin Ibáñez was rubbing his hands nervously next to them.

"We are fully prepared, mi comandante… Are they bringing him here? Is he alone? What does he look like? Is it a Faata or a t'ho of a privileged caste?"

Vrba did not answer these questions, turned to the translator's grey box, and said, "Is this thing going to work? Are you certain?"

Helga Swahn frowned. Her colleague, a small energetic woman, threw an indignant glance at Karel Vrba.

"Do you have reason to doubt it, Commodore? We've been developing this device for over eight years, testing it on Timokhin's audio recordings, the ones from the failed negotiations, and Corcoran had verified it… Corcoran and that Secret Service officer with the modified throat. An excellent translation in both directions, with all the nuances of the language!"

"I would prefer to see Corcoran and that same officer here," Vrba replied glumly. "You say that it's an excellent translation with all the nuances? Those are emotions, Doctor. I'm not planning on reading Byron or Mickiewicz here. I need an adequate translation!"

Maybe Dr. Cuba wanted to retort, but she ended up frozen with her mouth open. The elevator hummed, the walls of the cab opened, and a Faata appeared in the room, escorted by Paulinen and three armored marines. He was young and handsome: a pale narrow face with a tiny crimson mouth and silver eyes, long black hair, a slim figure, and graceful movements, like a fairytale elf. His tight-fitting clothes shone blue, then azure, then violet, his feet stepped silently, his arms were bent at the elbows, his hands were raised to his face, as if he was trying to read something that was written on his palms. The gesture of submission, the Commodore recalled. The gesture of someone who has lost a battle and was prepared to part with his life.

The women behind him gasped quietly, Ibáñez sucked in air loudly, and Karel Vrba, turning his head, called them to order with a single movement of his eyebrows. Then he nodded at a spot in front of the translator.

"Stand here! And turn on your infernal machine!"

The Faata, guessing the meaning behind the order, stepped to the Loudmouth, looked it over, and, without lowering his hands, shifted his gaze to the Commodore. _If only Litvin were here!.. _flashed a thought in Vrba's head. He remember his story; maybe not as clearly and completely as Corcoran, for his source was the documents and the recordings, not living tales. But he remembered enough to chuckle for a second. Reality has a strange sense of humor, it played strange games, when, inverting the past, poured new liquor into an old wineskin. All this had happened before! There had been a helpless captive on an alien ship, who had stood before the powerful Faata, surrounded by guards, translators, intermediaries, aliens from an unknown world, foreign and unkind… _All that is repeating like a reflection in the mirror_, Karel Vrba thought, _except the captive is now a Faata, and the ship, the translators, and the guards are mine!_

"You can lower your hands," he spoke, and Loudmouth Ben produced a series of wheezes and clicks.

The captive obeyed and responded; his speech was far more melodious than the translator's.

"You are who?" the Loudmouth translated. "Are who? Kni'lina? Meet Third Phase? Meet before?"

The Commodore stood straight. He was a head taller than the Faata, broader in shoulders, and looked like a giant next to him.

"I'm not a Kni'lina, I'm a Pillar of Order of another race. Your ship invaded our star system. Yata… Do you know this name?"

The names were problematic: the translator gave their terrestrial pronunciation. He spent the next several minutes arguing with the captive, who appeared not to understand the name.

"Allow me," Helga Swahn whispered from behind the Commodore.

"Silence!" he growled and repeated, stretching out the first syllable, "Yyaata, Yyaata."

"Is so," Loudmouth Ben finally informed him. "Know Yata. Hear. Ship leave before I born."

_Very young, even by Earth standards_, Vrba thought. _Young and innocent. Under different circumstances, we might…_

He narrowed his eyes. The circumstances were as they were. Deaths of millions separated them.

"Yata ship," the Loudmouth grated. "What ship Yata? What happen, occur, make?"

"I said that Yata invaded out system," the Commodore spoke. "We have destroyed his ship and the entire crew. Now we are here."

A pressure on his brain, weak, barely noticeable. Vrba stretched his lips; this was not a smile but a sign of irritation understandable to the captive. Human psychologists were familiar with some of the elements of Faata facial expressions.

"I know that you're a Keeper, and I understand what you're trying to do. It won't work. My mind is impervious to psychic probing."

"T'ho?" the captive asked, touching his forehead with his thin fingers.

"Pillar of Order." The Commodore put a hand on his chest. "Fully sentient Pillar of Order, and, henceforth, the ruler of the New Worlds. The ruler of your rulers. You will do what I say."

The Loudmouth grated once again, but it appeared to have managed the translation. Awaiting the reply, Vrba glanced at his aides. All of them maintained a disciplined silence. The three members of the science team never took their eyes off the Faata, the marines in battle armor seemed to be statues of steel, and Third Officer Raivo Paulinen was looking around watchfully, trying to keep the guards by the hatches, and captive, and the marines guarding him in his line of sight. Green lights were visible on the holocameras: they were recording, and there was no doubt that Kiryanov and Borsetti, the _Europe_'s chief communications officer, would not miss a rustle or a sigh.

The translator croaked again, "What Bino Tegari Pillar of Order wish? What need do?"

"That's better. I feel that we've reached an understanding," Vrba said. "Can you contact Ro'on?"

"That so, Pillar of Order. Far, very far. But quasi-mind here help."

"Contact them. Now."

The captive's eyes dulled. Now Vrba had trouble seeing his pupils; they appeared to submerge to the bottom of the silver lakes, making the Faata's face appear similar to an android's dispassionate visage. A minute passed, then another, and the Keeper, still in trance, whispered something.

"Louder," the Commodore ordered. "Speak loudly and clearly, or the translating machine will not understand you."

"No contact Keeper Dyte," the reply came. "Mind no… contact… lost… rrrdd… vzz… absent… vzz… rdd…" The roaring and the squeals stopped, and Loudmouth Ben spoke. "No term available. No term available, no term available, no term available–"

"Information accepted. Exit cycle," the Commodore commanded. "Translate: Keeper Dyte not necessary. We need to contact the Pillars of Order on Ro'on and T'har. The first in the Sheaf."

The translator muttered several short, clipped phrases. The Faata's features froze. He appeared to have left this world and was wandering the space inaccessible to ships, devices, or thought. His smooth cheeks turned blue, and veins bulged and pulsed on his temples. He no longer looked like a sentient being; more like a machine, whose artful creator gave it a human appearance.

"He's under great stress, Don Commodore," Ibáñez spoke. "I believe it would have been easier to contact a Keeper than a Pillar of Order. The Keepers are trained to–"

"Waira," the captive suddenly spoke in a clear and strong voice. "Singa p'aata n'ori. Knitan'di. Alven r'ilat."

"Call achieve… reach… access…" the translator muttered, then chocked and informed them. "Untranslatable idiom, no term available. Reach Waira, Pillar of Order, Ro'on. Question: what say Waira?"

"Tell him that there is a battle fleet from the star system where Yata's ship was destroyed. Also tell him that, after that visit, we have no reason to like you. We've captured the shipyard, and we will destroy it, if the Pillar of Order rejects our terms."

The Loudmouth wheezed, trilled, repeating what was said in Faata'liu, then translated the captive's reply.

"Waira understand. Waira clear… no term available. Waira know… know about Bino Tegari. Two on planet… cause harm… Also small ship… Ro'on orbit… attacked. Near destruction."

"The _Litvin_… our frigate…" Ibáñez whispered. "And those two… My God! He means Corcoran and Siebel!.."

The Commodore's face turned to stone.

"Have him call off his modules and leave my people alone. Immediately!"

"Did… Waira did so… does… What else? Petition… request… wish… not touch big ship in shipyard… not touch quasi-mind… What for that? What Bino Tegari Pillar of Order wish?"

"You must leave Ro'on, T'har, and Aezat. The fully sentient and their chosen t'ho will fly away now. You can send a fleet of transports for the rest. We'll give you the large ship with the quasi-mind, but the modules guarding the shipyard will stay here under our control. That is all!"

Perspiration appeared on the Keeper's forehead; it was obviously difficult to maintain a connection at cosmic distances. Vrba had no idea, could not even imagine, what forces were in play to allow thought to instantly cross the distance between Obscurus and Ro'on. Except for the half-breed Corcoran, there were no telepaths or telekinetics on Earth, and no hopes that they would ever appear. There were only charlatans tricking the public. Half of them were Binucks and believed themselves to be descended from the Bino Faata.

"Waira agree… agrees… Only not destroy ship," Loudmouth Ben wheezed. "Waira ask: is another option? Not leave New Worlds… What in this case? Is al… alternative?"

Clenching his fists, the Commodore spoke slowly.

"There is always an alternative. If you don't leave to the other side of the Void, I will give you an Eclipse. A total one! In the very near future!"

His eyes flashed menacingly from beneath his bushy eyebrows.


	11. Chapter 10

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (Ответный удар) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Chapter 10**

**Ro'on's orbit and the surface of Ro'on**

The water continued to flow. The black pits of the scorched pools were overflowing, and the sea, bursting into the domes, was rocking the burned light plastic debris on the waves, smashing at the walls, swirling the long lashes of seaweed. But Corcoran did not notice the chaos and ruin surrounding him. His thought, carried by someone's powerful external will, was now flying through the emptiness, as effortlessly as in a Dream, piercing Ro'on's atmosphere and the warm violet skies, which were replaced by the cold and the darkness. This illusion that appeared to him while he was awake was so clear, so real! He remembered that he was standing on the platform under the twin domes, feeling the ribbed handle of the emitter with his palm, hearing Klaus's whisper, "Follow me… follow me, Paul…" and even had a good guess as to whose psychic force was pushing him, helping him rise above the planet and head for the ship. There, to the lightning flashes of the annihilators, the clouds of scorching gas, and the crimson splatters of metal rising in molten fountains, eclipsing the stars. There, where his people were dying.

"Red Alert," Selina Praagh said, bending over the sphere of the intercom. "Everyone to their battle stations. Seriy and Santini to the fighters, Yamaguchi and Dupressis to the auxiliary bridge. Hernandez, engage the force shield. Pelevich, where are your men?.."

"Already in the turrets," the gunner replied. "I'm at the annihilator controls."

"Fire on my command." Selina's voice was even, as if the frigate wasn't about to be attacked by two dozen Faata ships, but was merely observing a pair of harmless rocks passing by.

In accordance with regulations, there were three people on the bridge: Tumanov, the first navigator, Bai Ling, the pilot, and Praagh, sitting in her usual seat at the radar screen. Its round eye was covered by a scattering of black dots; they were approaching like a swarm of bees, and each of these angular bees was brandishing a poisonous sting.

"There's too many of them," Tumanov growled and looked at Bai Ling, as if needing his support. "We need to leave, XO. Best of all…" the navigator's fingers danced over the ANS buttons, "yes, best of all would be to rise above the ecliptic and set course towards seventeen degrees respective to the galactic pole. We'd get far enough away from the planet in a day and dive into Limbo. If they don't catch us before that."

"The Captain and Siebel are on Ro'on," Selina Praagh reminded him in the same even voice. "We won't leave without them."

"Then we'll have to risk it." Tumanov waved a hand over the console, sending the calculated route into ANS memory. He looked at Bai Ling once again, but the pilot's face seemed dispassionate. Bai Ling was a little over thirty, and he did not remember the Invasion itself, but he never forgot the ruins of Hong Kong.

"First pilot to Lieutenant Commander Praagh," the intercom voiced. "We're in the machines. Ready to go."

"Yamaguchi, launch the Peregrines on my mark."

"Aye-aye, ma'am."

"Three, two, one… mark!"

The frigate shuddered.

"We're in space," Yegor Seriy reported. Let's twist their balls off. Pardon the expression, Lieutenant Commander."

"Attack their flanks," Praagh ordered. "Pelevich, ready the guns. They haven't scattered yet. Target the central group. All turrets… fire!"

Flames shot out, rushing towards the swarm of bees. Pelevich discharged the annihilator, but the thin blue beam was lost in the darkness, barely noticeable among the orange plasma streams. There was a silent explosion, a phoenix with four wings was born out of the darkness and scattered into a handful of sparks. Total destruction, Praagh noted; this meant that the annihilator had hit something. The plasma streams from the _Commodore Litvin_'s four turrets had also caught several modules, but she was unable to gauge the amount of damage: Bai Ling, taking the ship out of the zone of fire, sharply took her up, and stars flowed on the screen.

The next moment, the video sensors reacted, and the image changed again. A violet glow was shimmering under the frigate, the dense swarm fell apart, turning into a starfish with multiple tentacles, and two of them were convulsing and dancing, either trying to grab clumps of darkness, or evading the scarlet flashes. The Peregrines were fighting there, keeping the frigate from being surrounded, and each of them was dealing with two-three modules.

"The defenses are holding," Hernandez's voice came from the intercom.

"Got one," Seriy reported.

"The Peregrines are fine." That was Yamaguchi, who maintained contact with the fighters.

Praagh waved a hand above the console, and, following the silent order, Bai Ling turned the ship around. The _Litvin_'s turreted weapons could cover any object within their hemisphere, but the annihilator, their primary firepower, lacked such mobility. It was aimed by pushers and, partly, by maneuvering the ship.

"Ready," Pelevich reported.

"Fire!"

A new firebird fluttered out of the darkness and burned in a crimson flame. The caliber of the frigate's annihilator was smaller than on a cruiser, but it was sufficient to deal with the modules' shields. If only there weren't so many of them…

"Forward, Bai Ling," Praagh said. "Don't let them surround us!"

The ship slipped nimbly between two of the starfish's tentacles. Her guns were spitting out plasma, and scatterings of dazzling spots flared and melted away on the force screens protecting the enemy modules. The gunners, gripped by the fabric of the cocoons, connecting them to the frigate's computer, appeared motionless; their eyes were sliding along the targeting indicator grid, the light, barely noticeable movement of their feet was turning the barrels and the turrets, their fingers were touching the sensor keys. All four gunners were young but were already considered to be masters; Bob Wentworth and Sam Bigelow had come from the _Europe_, Vladimir Pashin was from the First Fleet, Cro Light Water was from the Second. For a moment, Selina imagined them hanging in their cramped turrets, hunched over, picking out targets and hitting them, hitting them… Hitting them, not knowing if they would be alive after the volley; the shields were lowered at that moment, and the turrets, like the contour drive with its acceleration shaft, were the most vulnerable areas of the ship.

The frigate was turning around to attack, the stars and the bright flashes of fire streams across the screens in a never-ending river. Blood pulsed in Selina Praagh's temples.

"Dupressis, their losses. Make it snappy, Camille!"

In single-ship engagements, when there was no need to maintain contact with other ships, the junior lieutenant monitored the enemy and the effectiveness of the gunners.

"Yes, ma'am! Reporting, ma'am: three modules destroyed, three appear to be disabled."

"Appear to be?"

"Can't say with certainty, ma'am. Three stopped firing, and sixteen small modules continue to fight."

"Small," Tumanov grumbled, peering into the maelstrom of glyphs above the ANS panel. "Of course, they're small! If they were the big ones, we'd already be smashed into fine powder from Ro'on to T'har!"

The frigate turned around. The Faata modules, just as fast and maneuverable, were rushing towards her, and death was hiding in the dark maws of their annihilators. Selina Praagh's heart skipped a beat. Did they have a chance to win this battle?.. Was there a possibility of rescuing the Captain and Siebel?.. She wasn't thinking about that now. She only knew that she wouldn't leave them.

Klaus, Klaus…

"Fire! All turrets, fire!"

The frigate shuddered. The acrid smell of burned plastic filled the air.

There was a crack, and Corcoran jerked awake. A section of the dome vanished, and the sky was visible through the gap, the clouds were floating through the violet expanse, and dark angular modules were making a smooth arc: first, second, third… The water raging under the platform had risen by another meter, and the lift shaft was flooded.

"They've found us," Siebel said. "They already know that both beasties have been destroyed. We need to get out of here, Paul."

Corcoran seemed not to hear him; squinting, he continued to stare at the Faata ships moving towards them, like shadows flitting through the clouds.

"She should've listened to Tumanov," he said. "Not engage in a fight, leave and escape into Limbo. She can still do that, if she…"

"If she what?"

"If she sacrifices the Peregrines. Bo and Yegor can hold off the enemy."

"Would you have given such an order?"

"Of course. If only we could send them a psychic transmission."

"That's impossible, Paul. The human brain is unreceptive to telepathic communication."

Siebel looked confused and crestfallen. Corcoran had never seen him like that; it seemed that the Metamorph Exile had indeed become a human and was now collecting stones of sadness in the valleys of helplessness and despair. His face trembled, like a reflection in rippling water; his features were melting, his skin and hair changing colors, and only the beak-shaped lips of an elderly Faata remained unchanged.

"Selina," he whispered, "Selina…"

He seemed to be answering her call for help.

"Let's get back to our module," Corcoran spoke. "There's a radio there. We can try to contact them."

Lightning flashed in the sky. The blinding brilliance forced him to close his eyes, but, when he looked again, he saw the brown walls of the canyon with the spots of moss, the outline of the module among the rocks, and the containers next to it. A robot towered over them, and the sensor hemispheres above its massive shoulders were slowly rotating, scanning the area. A laser slit opened, a dim light flashed and disappeared; the robot recognized its masters.

"Send it up, Klaus. One of them is already there, let them both watch the skies. I'm going to the transmitter."

Diving into the cabin, he activated voice communication. The cylinder of light started rotating, the callsign glyphs flowed, and Corcoran, as if picked up by their movement, once again soared above Ro'on, over the rocky plateau, cut up by gorges, over the dark strip of the canyon, which was guarded by the pair of robots. Sensing Siebel's presence and support, he was flying through the emptiness, to where his ship was fighting.

The frigate shuddered. The acrid smell of burned plastic filled the air, a web of tiny cracks covered the ceiling of the bridge, something fell down from up there, the deck shook, and the cocoon covering Selina Praagh's head extended the headrest plate. The orange flaming arrows coming out of the third and fourth turrets faded. Tumanov started coughing, inhaled hoarsely, and moved his chair closer to the navigation console, covering it from the falling debris. The blue beam of the _Litvin_'s annihilator pierced the darkness, bloomed into a hellish flower, and Bai Ling immediately sent the ship down. Down, up, to the side… The frigate tossed like a wounded whale among the flying deadly harpoons.

"The shield! What's going on with the shield?" Praagh shouted.

"Restored to eighty-three percent," Hernandez reported and added calmly. "Something's burning. The repair system has been activated."

The diagnostic unit spoke in a cold computer voice, "Damage to portside. Air regeneration is disrupted. There are punctures in the acceleration shaft, sectors seventeen and eighteen. Turret three is destroyed, Lieutenant Wentworth is dead. Turret four is disabled. There are cracks in the hull, the swivel mechanism is jammed. The amount of damage and Lieutenant Cro's condition are being clarified."

"Wentworth…" Tumanov muttered. "May he rest in peace… Wentworth and Cro Light Water…"

Robert Wentworth, the gunner in the third turret, had been vaporized, but Cro, the gunner in the fourth, could still be alive. His face, a bronze Navajo visage, flashed by Selina, when she bent over the intercom.

"Linder, take the robots and get Cro out. Take him to med-bay."

"I sent Linder to the regenerator," Hernandez called out. "We'll all suffocate without air."

"Got it. Let Dupressis go. Do you hear me, Camille?"

"Yes, ma'am. On my way."

"XO to the navigator, engineer, first pilot, gunner. Can we fight?"

"The ANS hasn't been damaged," Tumanov reported. Blood was running down his temple, probably hit by a piece of debris.

"The defense field is at a hundred percent," Hernandez's voice replied. "Linder and the repair bots are fixing the life support system. Two more brigades are in the acceleration shaft and at turret three, welding the cracks. Gravity drives were not hit."

"We're okay." The vocoder carried Seriy's raspy, whistling breath. "We're okay, Lieutenant Commander!" He swore in Russian, which Selina barely understood, and added. "Our armor is strong and our tanks are fast!"

The burning smell was cleared away on the bridge; it looked like Linder had managed to restore normal circulation.

"The annihilator, turrets one and two are ready for battle," Pelevich said. "Should we launch missiles, ma'am? We can't punch through their screens with them, but we can buy time for a maneuver… maybe one of them will put himself in front of the annihilator…"

"Launch, Kirill. Dupressis, how's the fourth turret?"

"The hatch is jammed. The bots are cutting it open…"

The missile salvo shook the deck of the frigate, more debris fell from the ceiling. Missiles, like swarms, were very ancient but effective weapons, as long as the target was not protected by force screens. The field deflected them, the warheads detonated, and, for a minute, the _Commodore Litvin_ was enveloped in flames, as if finding itself inside a star. That appeared to stun or frighten the enemy pilots; taking advantage of their confusion, Pelevich blasted one more machine, and Bai Ling took the ship out of the zone of fire. A fast-moving shadow darted in the depth of the viewscreen: a Peregrine chasing an angular craft. Bo or Yegor… A bright crimson flash blinded Selina for a moment, then the dark scar of the Void crossed the screen, the stars shook, and an outline of a battle module surfaced like a ghost from another universe. It sneaked up to port side, to the ruined turrets and the dead gunners… The maw of its weapon turned, looking into Selina Praagh's face. _The last thing I will ever see,_ she thought. _The black Void, a black maw, and the blue beam of an annihilator…_

The emitter in Cro's turret spat out a stream of fire. Clenching her fists, Praagh watched, as the plasma jet punched through the force shield, and hit the hull of the alien ship. The _Commodore Litvin_ dashed down and to the side, but the terrible explosion still reached her, tossed her up, like a piece of driftwood on a tsunami wave, causing Selina's teeth and bones to ache and her eyes to grow dark.

"He's alive, and he just saved us," Selina heard and realized that Tumanov was talking about Cro.

"Too close," Bai Ling answered. "Right next to the hull. The shield…"

The thought echoed in Praagh consciousness with a chain reaction: explosion too close… powerful explosion… right at the edge of the force field… the shield might not have held… The bulkheads lowered behind her, whirring, and the diagnostic unit reported.

"The force screen and the hull have been penetrated. The auxiliary bridge is depressurized. Second navigator Yamaguchi is dead. Multiple damages to the air circulation and regeneration subsystem."

Praagh bit her lip, not noticing the trickles of blood flowing down her chin. Oki Yamaguchi… Oki's spirit had departed to the Lord of Emptiness… She forced herself to forget about that and shouted out other names.

"Hernandez! Linder! How long can we keep breathing?"

The engineer's chuckle came in reply.

"I can guarantee three hours. If we live long enough."

After a steep turn, the ship crashed into the swarm of Faata modules. The Peregrines were covering her port side.

"We'll live as long as we can fire," gunner Pelevich said. "I'm ready, Lieutenant Commander."

"Fire!"

Lances of blue lightning furrowed the screen, the surviving turrets responded with scarlet splashes of their own. Both of them, Praagh noted; this meant that Pashin and Bigelow were still alive. The gun on the fourth turret was silent.

"Dupressis! Did you cut through the hatch?"

"Yes, ma'am. Cro…" The communications officer fell silent.

"Report on his condition, Junior Lieutenant!"

"He's still alive. I think, he is… I'm transporting him to the med-bay. His rib cage… crushed… loss of blood and severe burns… and his arm, ma'am… right arm… it's gone."

"Do you know how to use the resuscitator?"

"The sarcophagus? Yes, ma'am. But he needs immediate surgery… I don't think I can do it without Linder…"

"Linder's busy. If you can't do it, Light Water will die," Praagh said dryly.

One of the Peregrines covering the frigate suddenly flared an orange glow. It disappeared a second later, the fighter was maneuvering and continued to fire, but it appeared to be flying on automatic. Bo or Yegor?.. Whose heart had just stopped beating?.. Who had flown off into the Great Emptiness?.. Overcoming a panic attack, she bent over the intercom to make a query and heard a voice.

"Calling the _Commodore Litvin_. This is the Captain. Praagh, Tumanov, Hernandez, Pelevich, answer! This is the Captain. Captain calling the senior officer."

_Praise the Lord of Emptiness_, Selina Praagh thought, _they're alive. Still alive. Still…_

"Captain," she called out, "Captain, Klaus…"

But, instead of a reply, there was the thunderclap of a distant explosion, then another, and Selina's heart sank. Where had these sounds come from? From her dying ship? From the deck, the cargo hold, a turret? Or had the radio wave carried them from the planet, where her commander and Klaus were located? Dear faithful Klaus, who had never said anything…

The explosion was so loud that Corcoran's ears started to ring. He froze, then, pulling himself away from the radio, ran outside. A flaming mushroom burst in the sky above the gorge, casting an ominous crimson hue, dark clumps of debris and broken machines were spinning near it, like singed birds. Slightly above that, a hundred meters from the rocky plateau, three angular vehicles were climbing into the zenith, pursued by the nearly invisible in the bright sunlight laser beams. A moment later, and they reached the modules, turning them into piles of burning wreckage. The sound of new explosions reverberated in the canyon as a dull lingering echo.

The robots, Corcoran realized, the robots with the laser weapons and Faata machines, probably non-combat ones. They lacked force screens and were flying low and slowly; maybe they were trying to locate the intruders, or that could have been a patrol flying over the northern territories. An ideal target for the robots! Like a flock of domestic ducks for a marksman! But the ducks could be followed by hawks.

"Klaus!" He looked around, looking for a familiar figure among the rocks. "Klaus, I have contacted the ship. Where are you, Klaus?"

His only reply was an echo, bouncing off the canyon's walls. He felt his soul, his mind, his heart, either of them, or everything that made up Paul Corcoran, suddenly split into two; one half was pulling him back, to the receiver, while the other knew that he would not return to the module until he found Siebel.

Where could he have gone? Corcoran thought about that, watching the debris of the four machines fall from the sky. Headed up along with the robot? Decided to take a walk in the gorge? Teleported into another canyon or another part of the continent? To the other hemisphere? Why?

There was only one way to find out. Looking back at the module, where he could hear Selina's voice, Corcoran entered into a mental trance, sending out short, powerful pulses. Not words, for words were determined by language, and he was not using any language used on Earth, he was simply calling.

"Where are you, Klaus? Are you all right? Answer! Klaus! Klaus!"

The reply came immediately, from above, where the combat robots and the multi-armed observation spider were standing guard.

"Quiet, Paul! And forgive me, I was careless, I should've guessed! Be quiet, quiet! They're close! They're tracing us by our mental emissions. There are other Keepers besides Dyte… there are, but they think I'm alone… You can leave, after I–"

There was another explosion above, and the contact was lost. Corcoran threw his head back; a battle module, surrounded by a shifting haze of force fields, was hovering in the sky, raking the upper edges of the cliff. The robots were replying, but, this time, the enemy was different, not a duck, but a beaked and clawed hawk: the lasers could not penetrate its defenses, and the few small missiles exploding on the force screen did no damage. Vortexes of flame and smoke spun over the gorge, the blue beam of the annihilator flashed several times, a hail of stones fell down, and crimson streams of lava started to come down the side. Corcoran realized that there could only be one outcome of that fight.

Two columns of flame darted into the sky, cutting through the cloud of smoke. He tried to contact the robots through his communication bracelet, but it was hopeless: it didn't look like they had survived. This did not upset Corcoran much, as his thoughts were filled with something immeasurably more important: where was Siebel and was he okay? He wasn't thinking about how close his own death was, even though he knew that, if the annihilator's beam passed along the gorge, nothing would remain of Paul Corcoran.

The dust and the smoke, clouding over the canyon, were covering the sky, but he managed to make out the angular hull of the module. The machine was hovering motionless, ready to come down or drown the gorge in lava flow, but that did not scare Corcoran. _Klaus! Where are you, Klaus? Should I risk a mental search? No, he asked to be quiet…_

The module shuddered and started to rise, becoming smaller with each passing second. The rectangular shape turned into a line, then into a dot, and disappeared, swallowed up by the smoke cloud. Did it fly away? That was not clear; the pilot, merely an adjunct to the machine, did not make such decisions. Then it must have been called off? Why?

He did not have time to finish that thought; the air surged, pushing Corcoran slightly, and Siebel's body appeared on the ground between two containers. He was lying in an uncomfortable position, his right arm twisting under him, and his eyes were open, head bloody, shoulder and chest burned so much that he could see ribs through the charred flesh. Horrified, Corcoran stepped towards him, got down to his knees, bent over, looking into Klaus's familiar face, his features warped by pain. He no longer looked like a Faata; his wrinkles and grey hair were back, but now he looked about ten years older. Or twenty, Corcoran thought. Then again, the age of someone who got burned by infernal fire hardly mattered.

"Klaus! Can you hear me, Klaus?"

"Yes." He caught Corcoran's eye and suddenly chuckled. "Do I look bad, Paul? Don't worry. I'm not human after all, but a creature of a different nature. A human would already be dead… from the shock, from the damage to the skull, from the broken neck, from a piece of a rib piercing the heart… And, of course, from the burns."

"Is that a diagnosis?" Corcoran asked. He recovered, forcing out the feelings of horror and inevitable loss. Siebel was right, of course, all these wounds were not fatal to a shapeshifter.

"The diagnosis will be different," his friend spoke. "But first, tell me, have they left? Up there, I tried to give a performance… everything was realistic, authentic: a battle, the enemy's burned corpse, the remains of the robots, the death agony… Did they leave?"

"Yes, but I think there was a different reason."

"It doesn't matter. You can fly away, and I'll go to a safe haven, to eternal rest…"

"Will you leave to return?"

"I don't know yet. Whatever happens, Paul, whatever happens."

"There's no need for that," Corcoran spoke, hoping to get him to change his decision. "Selina is alive, and so is our ship. They're fighting, Klaus. I heard her voice… she was calling for you."

"I heard her too, heard her every call. I can't send my thoughts to her… But you, Paul, can tell her: Klaus died with her name on his lips. Tell her that, don't forget. Your women are so gentle, so sensitive…"

"You old sly fox!" Corcoran exclaimed, watching the horrible burns disappear from Siebel's shoulder. "A clever old crook!"

"Maybe so. And now go. Go, Paul, and let me die in peace and quiet. Death is a private matter. I don't need any witnesses."

As if saying goodbye, Corcoran rubbed his hand and stood. Glancing at the sky, still covered by smoke, he headed towards the module with firm steps. An unending maelstrom of glyphs was floating over the radio, and Selina Praagh's voice kept repeating, "Captain, Klaus! Captain, I have received your call. There is important information. Captain, reply!"

The communication was suddenly cut short. Bai Ling was maneuvering, trying to avoid the strikes of blue lightning, the frigate's weapons were hitting the enemy, the Peregrines were sliding near the damaged turrets, the engineers were working on the regenerator somewhere in the depths of the ship, and Selina Praagh seemed to have fallen out of this cycle for a moment: she was sitting, staring at the radio, and hearing the unintelligible chorus of muttering stars. No messages after the explosions, only the rustling of interference. The explosions had taken place there, on Ro'on, the computer had not reported any new damage, and their maimed frigate continued to stay afloat. She could still fight and could hear her captain's call.. But the Captain was silent.

Tumanov turned to Selina. A bloody path stretched from the temple to the ear on his broad face.

"Command, XO! We're in battle!"

She jerked her head, hitting it on the plate of the headrest.

"Did you hear, Nikolay? The Captain! It was the Captain!"

"I heard. I, Sancho, Kirill, Bai Ling… We all heard! And we'll answer him when he calls."

"Something blew up there."

"Not much of a surprise," the intercom spoke in Pelevich's voice.

The _Litvin_ and its two loyal Peregrines were on the attack, and Praagh forgot about the silent radio. There were fewer dots on the radar now, but many still remained: thirteen. They were crawling all over the screen to squeeze the frigate from all sides; a simple but the most effective tactic given their numerical superiority. The defense field was holding at maximum, the annihilator and the drive were intact, and yet, with only half her gunners and weapons, the ship was losing the battle. There was also something wrong with one of the Peregrines. Yamaguchi had been tracking the UF, and, wondering why he was silent, Selina remembered that Oki Yamaguchi was dead.

"Seriy, Santini! What's going on?"

"Bo's dead, and I'm controlling both machines," the first pilot answered. It's difficult to maneuver, but I can shoot. Still have plenty of ammo! Tons! Enough for all the Binucks!"

He added something incomprehensible and strong in Russian that went past Selina's consciousness. She was already submerging into another space, the world of speeds, distances, coordinates, and hers and enemy's firepower. Where, when, who, but only so that her own ass didn't get kicked… This game theory problem, which accounted for tolerances, errors, and the enemy's unpredictable behavior, was flawed, meaning it had a whole range of decisions with various uncertainty. The person and the computer had to choose one, and that choice was confirmed by a word.

"Fire!"

The volley went into empty space. The marks on the radar were crawling towards the edge of the screen, the Faata battle modules continued to scatter, like ants from a burning anthill. The meaning behind their maneuvers was unclear: they were moving away from the _Commodore Litvin_ to the distance of twenty-thirty kilometers and did not appear to want to attack or defend. Moreover, they were not shooting! They were moving towards Ro'on in a wide cone, as if trying to avoid a pursuit; the _Litvin_ could have caught one of the machines, but not the entire dispersed group.

"What's happening?" Tumanov muttered. "Some sort of ploy?"

"I think they're leaving," Selina Praagh said, frowning in puzzlement. "Returning to the planet."

The navigator wiped the blood from his temple.

"Let's not rush. Could be a tactical move of some sort… Pelevich, what do you think?"

"I think they're making a break for it," the gunner replied. "But we'd better wait. We have plenty to do."

"We do," Selina agreed. "Hernandez, relieve Linder; have him go to the med-bay, Cro needs help. Seriy get back aboard. Camille, is Cro in the resuscitator?"

"Yes, ma'am. He–"

"Linder will relieve you. Go to the hold. You'll receive Bo Santini. Maybe he's still alive… Prepare a second sarcophagus." She thought for a moment and added, "Pelevich, I'm not canceling the Red Alert. All gunners are to stay at their posts."

The receiving hatches opened, the Peregrines vanished in their dark mouths one after the other. The hull of Santini's fighter was melted, and Praagh thought that the pilot, or his corpse, would have to be cut out with a laser. Her heart was full of grief. Santini, Wentworth, Yamaguchi, Light Water… They'd lost a quarter of the crew or more: they still hadn't heard from the Captain or Siebel.

She barely had a time to think about that, when light flashed above the receiver, and glyphs started spinning in it. The transmission was only through voice and symbols; communication officer Borsetti's voice was barely audible, but the glyphs were duplicating the information. Praagh, Tumanov, and Bai Ling watched in fascination at the dance of the dark characters, perceiving them with a habitual ease and barely paying attention to Borsetti. When the transmission had ended, and the computer had restored the audio sequence, Praagh spoke.

"All crew: cancel the Red Alert. We have a transmission from the _Europe_. Activating playback."

They listened to the transmission one more time. Now the officer's voice was clear and distinct. Tumanov unzipped his cocoon and pushed away from the ANS panel, Bai Ling was sitting hunched over with his head down: the tension of the battle had not yet left him.

"Report. Linder, Dupressis, Pelevich, Hernandez. I'm listening."

"Cro is clinically dead," Linder said. "He's in the regenerator, the bleeding has been stopped. I'm working, but the odds are one in nine. I'm afraid we're going to lose him."

"I cut open the upper dome of the Peregrin." There was desperation in Dupressi's voice. "Santini's dead, ma'am. The first pilot said it was due to high temperature. We'll move the body… what's left of it… into a burial container."

"Two of my gunners and the remaining weapons are fine. As am I," Pelevich informed her.

"We have about three-four hours of air left, then we'll have to shut off the life support system. Can't repair it during operation," Hernandez said. "The work will probably take at least a day. Either we get into vacuum suits, or–"

"Let's head for Ro'on and set down on the ground," Selina Praagh ordered. "What's the state of the auxiliary bridge, Sancho?"

"I've sent robots. The compartment is pressurized."

"Pelevich, you and your people are on burial detail. Deliver Yamaguchi's body, put it into a container. Prepare another one for Wentworth… as tradition dictates…"

"Understood, Lieutenant Commander," the gunner answered. "On my way."

"Nikolay, set course for Ro'on. I'll try to contact the Captain again. Now they won't dare harm him, if he's alive."

"If he's alive…" Tumanov echoed, but Selina, having bent over the transmitter, did not hear him.

"Captain, Klaus! Captain, I received your call. We have important information. Captain, reply!"

Glyphs were rotating in the pillar of light, Selina Praagh's and other voices: of the navigator, the pilot, the engineer, and the gunner, were coming through. Corcoran was listening to them, leaning on the soft wall of the cabin, looking at the gorge and the sky through the open hatch, where the smoky veil had not yet dissipated. The voices were music to his ears. That was the symphony of the ship, the sounds making it alive, as familiar and dear to him as the rustling of the leaves in the garden or the ringing of the bells flowing over the Dnieper. Praagh, Bai Ling, Tumanov, Pelevich, Hernandez… They had survived. Who else?

"This is the Captain," he spoke quietly. "Praagh, I'm on the line."

A long-long sigh of relief. Then, "Captain! I heard explosions…"

"Don't pay them any mind. Anything from the flotilla?"

"Yes, sir, from the Commodore. The shipyard at Obscurus has been captured, the resistance has stopped. The Commodore contacted the Pillars of Order, the modules attacking us were called off. We fought them and–"

"I know. Report our losses, Lieutenant Commander."

"Captain! Those explosions–"

"I repeat, Praagh: report our losses."

"Bob Wentworth," she said after a short pause. "Direct hit to turret three, not even ashes were left… Oki Yamaguchi. Died on the auxiliary bridge. Bo Santini. Burned in his fighter. Light Water. Still alive, in the resuscitation unit. The rest… You'll see them soon, Captain. We're coming to you."

Wentworth, Yamaguchi, Cro, Santini… Corcoran's throat went dry. Swallowing convulsively, he asked, "The ship's condition?"

"The port turrets have been blasted. The cracks in the hull and the acceleration shaft have been welded. The life support system is damaged, there is a problem with air circulation. But we haven't lost speed. The planetary drives and the force shields are fine. We can land. We're tracking your signal. What does the area look like there, sir?"

"A plateau in the north of the large landmass. There are cracks, gorges, and I'm in one of them. There is melted rock and the remains of our robots at the top. You'll find it quickly."

"Those explosions?" Selina Praagh asked for the third time.

"Yes. We were also attacked. And we also have losses." Corcoran clenched his fists. It was better to tell her now, he decided and spoke, "Siebel is dead."

Silence. Then Tumanov's voice came through, "You can cry if you want, Selina. We're looking away."

"He didn't die instantly," Corcoran said. "He asked to tell you that nothing is lost, and everything will return to you. Everything! Do you understand, Selina? Faith, hope, love… He was a very wise man, one of those who can foresee what's coming."

Consoling was not an easy task, Corcoran thought. Doubly so, if his own Vera, Nadezhda, and Lyubov were well, alive, and always with him… Not easy, but he had to do it. Such was the captain's duty: to talk to those whose loved ones would not return.

Wentworth, Yamaguchi, Santini… Possibly, Light Water…

"Lieutenant Commander! Can you hear me?"

"Yes, sir. I… I remember my responsibilities."

_A brave tin soldier_, Corcoran thought. Aloud, he said, "Clarify the information received from the _Europe_."

"The _Asia_ is on her way to T'har, the _Africa_ and the _America_ are preparing to jump to Aezat's system," Praagh said in a quiet dead voice. "The _Antarctica_ stayed at the shipyard, while the _Europe_ and the _Australia_ are heading for Ro'on. They're escorting a large ship with a quasi-mind. In accordance with the agreement they had reached, it will take the Faata from the New Worlds and some of the t'ho, then head to the other side of the Void. They will send ships for the remaining t'ho. There are twenty-two million of them on the three planets."

"Instructions for us?"

"To prepare the frigate for flight to the Solar System. The route is the same, through Gondwana and Baal. We will take the Commodore's report to fleet HQ and the Parliament. They also sent us a list of their dead. All from the crews of the _Asia_, the _Africa_, and the _Antarctica_. They were the ones who assaulted the shipyard."

"May the Lord of Emptiness be merciful to them," Corcoran spoke. "I'm waiting for you. Over and out."

Leaving the module, he stepped out into the gorge, studded with stones and the debris from the broken ships. The orange sun had passed its zenith, and was now hovering over the southwestern edge of the cliff, the wind had dispersed the dust and the smoke, and the violet sky seemed bright and clear, not clouded by explosions or singed by fire. Clouds were slowly moving up there, lit up by the sun and, therefore, slightly pink, like a flock of giant flamingos. The moss on the sides of the gorge had been burned off completely, and now their grey and brown background was diversified only by the solidified lava flows, which gleamed like polished mirrors. If one ignored the clouds, everything was motionless; Corcoran did not see any flying machines, or birds, or any other animals, snakes or lizards.

"T'taia orr n'uk'uma sirend'agi patta…" he spoke phrase, familiar from childhood, like a spell. "A sirend came out to the sun and is basking in the warmth of the stones… It would be nice to take a look at one, Auntie Yo, since I've finally made it to your home planet. Almost. You lived on T'har, after all…" Corcoran thought for a moment, then added, "No, you lived on Earth, where you learned to smile. You only existed on T'har."

Taking several steps, he sat down on a stone near Siebel. That one looked like a real corpse, stiff, bloody, but the burns on the chest and the shoulder no longer looked as terrible; his friend the Metamorph had obviously corrected some things out of a sense of aesthetics. Sighing, Corcoran buried his face in his knees, concentrated, and fell into a mental trance. But he was unable to perform the probe: either because he subconsciously did not want to get used to Faata thoughts, or for another, more important reason. Perhaps, he was nearing the age of maturity, and his gift, having grown stronger in the New Worlds, could allow something had never done before, never known, and never even dreamed. Something like that vision aboard the Silmarri ship.

There was darkness in front of him, hiding the future, and Corcoran pushed it apart with his will, like a stage curtain. Vague images slowly flowed before him: he saw Vera with a crown of grey, platinum-hued hair and his grown daughters, saw Nadya on some low, circular island that was swaying in the ocean ripple, saw a satellite, which was, without a doubt, a military base, circling Ro'on, saw himself on the bridge of a cruiser, as enormous as an orbital complex, surrounded by a whole squadron of frigates and transports. He also saw alien ships, Faata starships, moving across the Void, wave after wave, and there were four such invasions [_Corcoran is foreseeing a large-scale conflict between humankind and the Faata, the four so-called Void Wars that would last for over a century._], for neither empire wished to yield, subdue its stubbornness, hate, and pride: not the humans, not their enemies, who were also humanoid. He saw the human race establish itself: in battles and planetary conquests, in victories and defeats, in the search for allies, in struggles with enemies, in contacts with those who were neither friend nor foe, whose goals and minds seemed incomprehensible.

The visions finished flowing and disappeared, the darkness drew its threshold once again, and Corcoran opened his eyes. Siebel was lying next to him, as insensate as a marble statue. _Who will I tell my Dreams to now?.._ a thought came. He rose and muttered, "Remember, you promised to come back. Not only to Selina, but to me too."

Then he threw his head back and examined the skies. They were no longer empty; a silver spark was glittering in the zenith. His frigate was coming in to land.


	12. Epilogue

_This is a fan translation of _Counterstrike_ (Ответныйудар) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the second book in a six-book series called _Arrivals from the Dark_ (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called _Trevelyan's Mission_ (Миссия Тревельяна)._

_I claim no rights to the contents herein._

* * *

**Epilogue**

The enormous Ship was overcrowded: they had to not only evacuate the fully-sentient beings from Ro'on, T'har, and Aezat, but also many tens of thousands of t'ho. All the assistants from the higher castes, all the olks and the pilots and, naturally, all the females, so that the damned Bino Tegari would not try to cross-breed their genes with those of the Faata. There were too many females, and Waira had ordered the less valuable specimens put to death. They had been turned into biomass, and then into a protein concentrate, as it always happened during long journeys through space, when there were insufficient food sources. Waira felt sorry for these females no more than for the millions of t'ho workers and tiny quasi-minds, who had stayed behind in the New Worlds.

The aliens had suggested that they return for them, and he, Waira, would do that. He would return. Him and the other Pillars of Order, Foyn and Yass from Ro'on, Ein from T'har, and Neyho from Aezat. All of them would return, and they would bring Ships, pilots, and battle modules. They would come back not only for the insignificant t'ho, but to burn the aliens, and spread their ashes in the emptiness. The Third Phase did not forgive debts, and these Bino Tegari were big debtors: for Yata's destroyed Ship, for the attempt to take the New Worlds, and for the obliteration of the shipyard, and Dyte and his quasi-sentients. As for the t'ho workers, those imbeciles left behind on T'har, Ro'on, and Aezat, their cost was small. In a few cycles, the small brains would send a signal, the lives of the t'ho would end, and the three planets would be covered in bodies. Millions of bodies! Mountains of bodies! The Bino Tegari would like that. Their leader had told them that Yata was guilty of the deaths of people on his planet. Well then, millions had died there, millions would die here… The Bino Tegari would have to spend a long time burning the bodies. Or clone more p'hots, so that they ate the carrion…

Had Waira known what laughter was, he would have burst out laughing. But such emotion had atrophied among the Faata long ago, just like many other feelings: love and attachment, gratitude, faith and mercy. But they knew how to hate. The hate for the Bino Tegari was, probably, the strongest feeling in their range of emotions.

Standing by the Ship's Observation Sphere, walling off his mind from the quasi-mind and the minds of the pilots, Waira was nurturing his hatred. He would pass this feeling to the other Pillars of Order like a drive for action, like a sign of danger, and they would respond, for Waira's age and the power of his psychic call had made him a leader. He knew that he would live for another century or two, and that would be enough to return to the New Worlds and even to go farther, to the aliens' homeworld. He would find them, wherever they were hiding! The search would not take long: no one had heard of this race: not the Haptors, not the Dromi, not the Kni'lina, which meant that it had no remote colonies or subjugated worlds. Their homeworld was close to Ro'on, and it would be easy to find: all they had to do was follow Yata's route. And he, Waira, would do just that!

The brain controlling the Ship, reminding him about itself and urgent matters, touched his mind softly. The brain, the pilots, and Those Who Stand by the Sphere were waiting for his orders, and that filled Waira with a sense of power and his own importance. Glancing at the Sphere, at the barely visible dots of the stars of Ro'on and Aezat, dimly lit in its depths, he said goodbye to them and sent the necessary telepathic signal.

A ghostly glow flashed in the acceleration shaft, energy splashed out into space, and the Ship performed a jump, one of the many that would take it to the stars on the other side of the Void.

Another ship, extremely tiny compared to the Faata starship, was also preparing to jump. It would take place in four hours, at the end of the Captain's watch, when the awakening crew would get to their battle stations. Now, all the people, except for the officers of the watch, were sleeping and dreaming; some were seeing their homes and the faces of their loved ones, others were seeing those who had gone into the Emptiness, who would return only in memories. Sad dreams, happy dreams…

Corcoran and Bai Ling were sitting on the bridge, one was in the seat by the pentalion that would activate the interstellar drive, the other one was by the pilot's console. Besides them, Sigurd Linder was also awake, who was in the med-bay, by the cybersurgeon and the sarcophagus of the resuscitator. Cro's body was lying under its transparent lid, and there was still life within him; the beeping of the biosensors and the occasional pulses on the monitors were confirming that his heart was beating and his brain activity had not dropped down to zero.

There was an alcove with a narrow shaft in the med-bay's wall, the one that led to the ship's outer hull; the shaft led to the airlock. There were four cylindrical containers in the alcove, which were exactly the size necessary to fit in the shaft and slip into the outer airlock. Two of them held the bodies of Yamaguchi and Siebel, the third had Santini's burned bones and the remains of his implants, while Robert Wentworth's dress uniform was located in the fourth one. In accordance with tradition, the uniform was placed in the coffin, if there was nothing remaining from the person who had worn it, not even ashes. By the same tradition, the four containers would be ejected into the Emptiness, to fly through the galaxies and the nebulae, until the last stars burned out, and light dimmed, and the universe ended.

Linder was half-asleep on the couch, listening to the beeps of the biosensors. The sensors were beeping less and less, which meant that Cro Light Water was preparing to depart on his eternal voyage. Technically, he was already in the Great Emptiness, and only the computer controlling the resuscitator continued to maintain the illusion of life, forcing his heart to beat and his lungs to work. But, like all illusions, this one could also not go on for long, and Linder bitterly realized his helplessness. No one could resurrect Cro Light Water: not the doctors on the _Europe_, not the medics on Earth, not drugs or ingenious devices, for he had already crossed the threshold, where life was replaced by death's eternal silence.

The sensors beeped one last time and feel silent, immediately followed by the resuscitator's alarm chime. Linder wanted to get up, knowing that Cro could not be helped, only following his duty that called him to the dying patient. He wanted to get up and even managed to sit up, but he was suddenly gripped by strange sleepiness, forcing him to lie back down on the couch. Perhaps there was nothing strange about that: he had not slept in three days and was holding on only thanks to medicine.

The chiming of the alarm stopped, and silence fell upon the compartment, broken only by Linder's snoring. Five minutes had passed, ten, then a nude figure appeared next to one of the containers: a thin, short, and grey-haired man. The containers were sealed tight, and the cryogenic systems were on, but the grey-haired man easily slid the lid. The coffin was empty.

Leaving it open, the man silently slipped to the resuscitator and stood there, looking at Light Water's dead face and the monitors with the running flat lines. It seemed as if he was waiting for a sudden pulse or a sound that would hint that Cro was still alive, but the biosensors remained silent, and there were no waves or peaks on the screens. Shrugging, he muttered, "Forgive me, friend. But this is a very convenient opportunity," and began to free the dead body from the resuscitator's suckers. Then he carried him to the coffin, raised his hand in a farewell salute, and sealed the lid.

To get into the resuscitator, he did not make a single gesture, only suddenly ending up in the transparent sarcophagus, and the suckers with the tubes and the wires suddenly moved to the appropriate places. The vocoder of one of the sensors beeped, followed by a second, and a third, the lines on the monitor came alive, echoing occasional surges, then the pulses turned into a confident palisade. Simultaneously, the man in the resuscitator was changing: his skin had attained a bronze hue, his grey hair became black and shiny, his muscles expanded, his limbs grew longer, while his right hand disappeared, becoming a stump covered in vitaspray. He now looked exactly like Cro Light Water, and his wounds, broken bones, and burns looked identical. But his heart was beating more confidently and stronger, his chest was rising and falling in infrequent but uniform breaths, and the healing solutions, injected by the resuscitator, the electrostimulation, and the radiation therapy appeared to be working: he was definitely alive. Maybe even getting better.

Awakening from his brief nap, Sigurd Linder stared at the equipment in pleasant surprise. At the same time, Paul Corcoran, who was sitting on the bridge, felt the desire to visit the med-bay, so powerful, irresistible, and sudden, that shivers ran down his spine. He rose, nodded to Bai Ling, exited into the hallway, went through the wardroom with the portrait of Commodore Litvin hanging there, and stepped across the threshold of the med-bay. Linder, studying the biosensor readings and the dancing curves on the screens, turned around.

"Good news, Captain! Cro is coming back to life… Well, at least, his condition has stabilized."

"Those Native Americans are tough fellows," Corcoran muttered and stepped to the sarcophagus. "Sons of Manitou, wolves of the forest, bisons of the prairies… The Faata have nothing on them. Right, Cro?"

Cro said nothing; he was lying as before, motionless, wrapped in a web of wires and tubes.

"You know, sir," Linder admitted with a penitent look, "I almost dozed off. Only for a second… And it looked like Cro… well, you know… as if the sensors had zeroed out, and the monitor showed a clear background, and the sarcophagus was ringing… And I couldn't move. Not my arm, not my leg!"

"Must be glitches from the fatigue. You need to get some sleep, Sigurd," Corcoran said, peering into the face of the man in the resuscitator. Then he bent over and whispered quietly. "Welcome back, my friend. Eit t'tesi. I'm glad."

Light Water's lips quivered, and Corcoran thought he saw him smile.


End file.
